When the procession had quite departed and I could no longer hear the sound of singing, I remounted and rode on to my house, or rather to that of my mother, the great lady Tiu, which was situated beneath the wall of the old palace facing towards the Nile.  Indeed my heart was full of this mother of mine whom I loved and who loved me, for I was her only child, and my father had been long dead; so long that I could not remember him.  Eight months had gone by since I saw her face and in eight months who knew what might have happened?  The thought made me cold for she, who was aged and not too strong, perhaps had been gathered to Osiris.  Oh! if that were so!

I shook my tired horse to a canter, Bes riding ahead of me to clear a road through the crowded street in which, at this hour of sundown, all the idlers of Memphis seemed to have gathered.  They stared at me because it was not common to see men riding in Memphis, and with little love, since from my dress and escort they took me to be some envoy from their hated master, the Great King of the East.  Some even threatened to bar the way; but we thrust through and presently turned into a thoroughfare of private houses standing in their own gardens.  Ours was the third of these.  At its gate I leapt from my horse, pushed open the closed door and hastened in to seek and learn.

I had not far to go for, there in the courtyard, standing at the head of our modest household and dressed in her festal robes, was my mother, the stately and white-haired lady Tiu, as one stands who awaits the coming of an honoured guest.  I ran to her and kneeling, kissed her hand, saying,

“My mother!  My mother, I have come safe home and greet you.”

“I greet you also, my son,” she answered, bending down and kissing me on the brow, “who have been in far lands and passed so many dangers.  I greet you and thank the guardian gods who have brought you safe home again.  Rise, my son.”

I rose and kissed her on the face, then looked at the servants who were bowing their welcome to me, and said,

“How comes it, Lady of the House, that all are gathered here?  Did you await some guest?”

“We awaited you, my son.  For an hour have we stood here listening for the sound of your feet.”

“Me!” I exclaimed.  “That is strange, seeing that I have ridden fast and hard from the East, tarrying only a few minutes, and those since I entered Memphis, when I met——­” and I stopped.

“Met whom, Shabaka?”

“The lady Amada walking in the procession of Isis.”

“Ah! the lady Amada.  The mother waits that the son may stop to greet the lady Amada!”

“But why did you wait, my mother?  Who but a spirit or a bird of the air could have told you that I was coming, seeing that I sent no messenger before me?”