ne own must stab me in
my straits! Not even is the identity of mine assassin revealed, and
there is none on whom I may call with safety and ask protection--"

"Nay, nay, Beloved of Ptah," Kenkenes interrupted. "There be true men
among thy courtiers."

"Not one--not one whom I may trust," Meneptah declared hysterically.

"Here am I, then."

Meneptah, with the inordinate suspicion of the hard-pressed, backed
hurriedly away from Kenkenes.

"Who art thou?" he demanded. "How may I know thou art not mine enemy?"

"Not so," Kenkenes protested. "Give me ear, I pray thee. Would I have
brought thee thy warning, knowing it such, were I thine enemy? And
further, did not Jambres, the mystic, who readeth men's souls, trust
me?"

"Aye, so it seems," the king admitted, glad to be won by such physical
magnificence. "But who art thou?"

"Kenkenes, the son of Mentu, thy murket."

"It can not be," the king declared with suspicion in his eye. "The
murket had but one son and he must be dead with the first-born."

"Nay; I was in the land of Goshen, the night of death, and the God of
Israel spared me."

Meneptah continued to gaze at him stubbornly. Then a conclusive proof
suggested itself to Kenkenes, which, under the stress of an austere
purpose and a soul-trying suspense, he had no heart to use. But the
need pressed him; he choked back his unwillingness, and submitted.
Coming very close to Meneptah, he began to sing, with infinite
softness, the song that the Pharaoh had heard at the Nile-side that
sunrise, now as far away as his childhood seemed. How strange his own
voice sounded to him--how out of place!

At first, the expression of surprise in the king's face was mingled
with perplexity. But the dim records of memory spoke at the urging of
association. After a few bars, the Pharaoh's countenance had become
reassured. Kenkenes ceased at once.

"Enough!" Meneptah declared. "The gods have most melodiously
distinguished thee from all others. Thou art he whom I heard one dawn,
and mine heir in Osiris, my Rameses, told me it was the son of Mentu."

"Then, being of the house of Mentu, thou hast no fear of my
steadfastness, O my Sovereign?"

"Nay; would that I might be as trustful of all my ministers. Alas,
that a single traitor should lay the stain of unfaith upon all the
court! Ah, who is mine enemy?"

The sentence, more exclamatory than questioning, seemed to the young
man like a call upon him to voice his