ghts so that you may never sleep a wink, save in
full sunshine, and I will do it all and more. If I die, Merytra, we go
together. Now will you swear to be true, will you swear it by the oath
of oaths?"

The spy looked about her. She knew Kaku's power which was famous
throughout Egypt, and that it was said to be of the most evil sort, and
she feared him.

"It seems that this is a dangerous affair," she replied uneasily, "and I
think that I can guess your aim. Now if I help you, Kaku, what am _I_ to
get?"

"Me," he answered.

"I am flattered, but what else?"

"After Pharaoh the greatest place and the most power in Egypt, as the
wife of Pharaoh's Vizier."

"The wife? Doubtless from what I have heard of you, Kaku, there would be
other wives to share these honours."

"No other wife--upon the oath, none, Merytra."

She thought a moment, looking at the wizened but powerful-faced old
magician, then answered:

"I will take the oath and keep my share of it. See that you keep yours,
Kaku, or it will be the worse for you, for women have their own evil
power."

"I know it, Merytra, and from the beginning the wise have held that the
spirit dwells, not in the heart or brain or liver, but in the female
tongue. Now stand up."

She obeyed, and from some hidden place in the wall Kaku produced a book,
or rather a roll of magical writings, that was encased in iron, the
metal of the evil god, Typhon.

"There is no other such book as this," he said, "for it was written by
the greatest of wizards who lived before Mena, when the god-kings ruled
in Egypt, and I, myself, took it from among his bones, a terrible task
for his Ka rose up in the grave and threatened me. He who can read in
that book, as I can, has much strength, and let him beware who breaks an
oath taken on that book. Now press it to your heart, Merytra, and swear
after me."

Then he repeated a very terrible oath, for should it be violated it
consigned the swearer to shame, sickness and misfortune in this world,
and to everlasting torments in the next at the claws and fangs
of beast-headed demons who dwell in the darkness beyond the sun,
appointing, by name, those beings who should work the torments, and
summoning them as witnesses to the bond.

Merytra listened, then said,

"You have left out your part of the oath, Friend, namely, that you
promise that I shall be the only wife of Pharaoh's Vizier and hold equal
power with him."

"I forgot," said Kaku, and add