“If you mean the night of the Coronation, I do recall——­”

“Ah!  I thought you would.  You, learned Ana, who like all scribes observe so closely, will have noted how little things—­such as the scent of a flower, or the passing of a bird, or even the writhing of a snake in the dust—­often bring back to the mind events or words it has forgotten long ago.”

“Well—­what of our meeting?” I broke in hastily.

“Nothing at all—­or only this.  Just before it you were talking with the Hebrew Jabez, the lady Merapi’s uncle, were you not?”

“Yes, I was talking with him in an open place, alone.”

“Not so, learned Scribe, for you know we are never alone—­quite.  Could you but see it, every grain of sand has an ear.”

“Be pleased to explain, O Ki.”

“Nay, Ana, it would be too long, and short jests are ever the best.  As I have told you, you were not alone, for though there were some words that I did not catch, I heard much of what passed between you and Jabez.”

“What did you hear?” I asked wrathfully, and next instant wished that I had bitten through my tongue before it shaped the words.

“Much, much.  Let me think.  You spoke about the lady Merapi, and whether she would do well to bide at Memphis in the shadow of the Prince, or to return to Goshen into the shadow of a certain—­I forget the name.  Jabez, a well-instructed man, said he thought that she might be happier at Memphis, though perhaps her presence there would bring a great sorrow upon herself and—­another.”

Here again he looked at the child, which seemed to feel his glance, for it woke up and beat the air with its little hands.

The nurse felt it also, although her head was turned away, for she started and then took shelter behind the bole of one of the palm-trees.  Now Merapi said in a low and shaken voice: 

“I know what you mean, Magician, for since then I have seen my uncle Jabez.”

“As I have also, several times, Lady, which may explain to you what Ana here thinks so wonderful, namely that I should have learned what they said together when he thought they were alone, which, as I have told him, no one can ever be, at least in Egypt, the land of listening gods——­”

“And spying sorcerers,” I exclaimed.

“——­And spying sorcerers,” he repeated after me, “and scribes who take notes, and learn them by heart, and priests with ears as large as asses, and leaves that whisper—­and many other things.”

“Cease your gibes, and say what you have to say,” said Merapi, in the same broken voice.

He made no answer, but only looked at the tree behind which the nurse and child had vanished.

“Oh!  I know, I know,” she exclaimed in tones that were like a cry.  “My child is threatened!  You threaten my child because you hate me.”

“Your pardon, Lady.  It is true that evil threatens this royal babe, or so I understood from Jabez, who knows so much.  But it is not I that threaten it, any more than I hate you, in whom I acknowledge a fellow of my craft, but one greater than myself that it is my duty to obey.”