“I ask no throne, Prince.  If there were one to fill I should be content to leave that to you and your heirs.”

“So you say, no doubt honestly.  But would the children of Amada say the same?  Would you even say it if you were her husband, and would she say it?  Moreover she is a priestess, sworn not to wed, though perhaps that trouble might be overcome, if she wishes to wed, which I doubt.  Mayhap you might discover.  Well, you are hungry and worn with long travelling.  Come, let us eat, and afterwards you can tell your story.  Amada and the others will be glad to hear it, as I shall.  Follow me, Count Shabaka.”

So we went to the lesser banqueting-hall, I filled with joy because I should see Amada, and yet, much afraid because of that story which I must tell.  Gathered there, waiting for the Prince, we found the Princess his wife, a large and kindly woman, also his two eldest daughters and his young son, a lad of about sixteen.  Moreover, there were certain officers, while at the tables of the lower hall sat others of the household, men of smaller rank, and their wives, since Peroa still maintained some kind of a shadow of the Court of old Egypt.

The Princess and the others greeted me, and Bes also who had always been a favourite with them, before he went to take his seat at the lowest table, and I greeted them, looking all the while for Amada whom I did not see.  Presently, however, as we took our places on the couches, she entered dressed, not as a priestess, but in the beautiful robes of a great lady of Egypt and wearing on her head the uraeus circlet that signified her royal blood.  As it chanced the only seat left vacant was that next to myself, which she took before she recognized me, for she was engaged in asking pardon for her lateness of the Prince and Princess, saying that she had been detained by the ceremonies at the temple.  Seeing suddenly that I was her neighbour, she made as though she would change her place, then altered her mind and stayed where she was.

“Greeting, Cousin Shabaka,” she said, “though not for the first time to-day.  Oh! my heart was glad when looking up, outside the temple, I caught sight of you clad in that strange Eastern armour, and knew that you had returned safe from your long wanderings.  Yet afterwards I must do penance for it by saying two added prayers, since at such a time my thoughts should have been with the goddess only.”

“Greeting, Cousin Amada,” I answered, “but she must be a jealous goddess who grudges a thought to a relative—­and friend—­at such a time.”

“She is jealous, Shabaka, as being the Queen of women she must be who demands to reign alone in the hearts of her votaries.  But tell me of your travels in the East and how you came by that rope of wondrous pearls, if indeed there can be pearls so large and beautiful.”