while he called, saying:

"O Queen, cease to starve yourself in this miserable abode, and come
down to dwell in plenty with your faithful subject."

He called it once, and twice, and thrice, but there was no answer. Now
Abi grew afraid.

"She must have perished," he said, "and Egypt will demand her blood at
my hands. Kaku, go up and see what has happened. You are a magician, and
have nothing to fear."

But the astrologer thought otherwise, and hesitated, till Abi in a rage
lifted his cedar wand to strike him on the back. Then he went, step by
step, slowly, pausing at each step to address prayers and praises to her
Majesty of Egypt. At length he came to the door of the Queen's chamber,
and kneeling down, peeped into it, to see that it was quite empty. Next
he crawled across the landing to the chamber opposite, that which
had been Asti's, and found it empty also. Then, made bold by fear, he
ascended to the pylon roof. But here, too, there was no one to be seen.
So he returned, and told Abi, who shouted:

"By Ptah, great Lord of Memphis! either she has escaped to raise Egypt
on me, or she has sought death in the Nile to raise the gods upon me,
which is worse. So much for your interpretation of dreams, O Cheat."

"Wait till you are sure before you call me such names, Prince," replied
Kaku indignantly. "Let us search the temple, she may be elsewhere."

So they searched it court by court, and chamber by chamber, till they
came to that inner hall in front of the Sanctuary where Pharaoh had set
up his throne while he sojourned at Memphis. This hall was a dark place,
into which light flowed only through the gratings in the clerestory,
being roofed in with blocks of granite laid upon its lotus-shaped
columns. Now, at the hour of sunrise, the gloom in it was still deep,
so deep that the searchers felt their way from pillar to pillar, seeing
nothing. Presently, however, a ray of light from the rising sun sped
through the opening shaped like the eye of Osiris in the eastern wall,
and as it had done for thousands of years, struck upon the shrine of
the goddess, and the throne that was set in front of it, revealing the
throne, and seated thereon Neter-Tua, her Majesty of Egypt.

Glorious she looked indeed, a figure of flame set in the midst of
darkness. The royal robe she wore glittered in the sunlight, glittered
her sceptre, her jewels, and the _uraei_ on her Double Crown, but more
than all of them glittered her fierce and s