Cleomenes broke in upon the reading.  His face wore a mysterious smile.

“I have a rather strange piece of news for you, my lady,” he said.  “A chamberlain of the court has just been here, and brings a royal command.”

“I am not accustomed to being commanded,” interrupted Cornelia, all her Roman haughtiness rising.

“I do not think you will be found disobedient.  The queen, it seems, noticed you in my carriage yesterday, and at once divined, with that wonderfully quick wit of hers, that you must be a Roman lady of rank.  She immediately made inquiries, and now sends her chamberlain to ask you and the Lady Fabia, as well as myself, to dine with her at the palace to-night.  You may be sure nothing will be lacking to do you honour.”

Cornelia meekly acquiesced in this royal mandate.  Fabia, however, could not stir from the house.  The shock to her finely strung nature when she was taken from Rome had, indeed, produced a physical reaction.  She was not seriously ill, but could endure no excitement.  So it was with only Cleomenes for an escort that Cornelia mounted into one of the splendid royal chariots sent from the palace about dusk, and drove away surrounded by a cloud of guardsmen sent to do honour to the guests of the queen.

Cornelia herself felt highly strung and slightly nervous.  She wished, for the first time since she reached Alexandria, that she could go dressed in the native costume of a Roman lady, She was going to enjoy the hospitality of a princess who was the successor of thirty odd dynasties of Pharaohs; who was worshipped herself as a goddess by millions of Egyptians; who was hailed as “Daughter of the Sun,” and with fifty other fulsome titles; a princess, furthermore, who was supposed to dispose of the lives of her subjects as seemed right in her own eyes, without law of man or god to hinder.  Cornelia was not afraid, nay rather, anticipatory; only she had never before been so thoroughly conscious that she was Roman down to her finger-tips—­Roman, and hence could look upon the faces of princes unabashed.

The people saw the royal chariot, and some shouted salutations to the guests whom the queen delighted to honour.  The company swept up under the magnificent archway leading to the palace; above them rose tall Ionic columns of red granite of Syene, building rising above building, labyrinths of pillars, myriads of statues.  Torches were blazing from every direction.  The palace grounds were as bright as day.  The light breeze was sweeping through rare Indian ferns and tropical palms.  The air was heavy with the breath of innumerable roses.  Huge fountains were tossing up showers of spray, which fell tinkling onto broad basins wherein the cups of the blue and white lotus were floating.  It was indeed as if one had been led on to enchanted ground.

Cornelia and her friend dismounted from their chariot, and were led through an endless colonnade, past a second, lower gateway, and then into a hall, not very high or large, but admirable in its proportions, with a whole gallery of choice mythological paintings on its walls.  Small heed did Cornelia give to them.  For at the end of the hall rose a low dais, whereon sat, in a gilded chair, the same person who had been pointed out to Cornelia the day before as the mistress of Upper and Lower Egypt.