hospitable hearth, and the God of guests and hosts. And therefore
I will do this. I will call together the guard of which I am chief, and
tell them all thy shame, ay, and all my sorrow. I will shout it in the
streets, I will publish it from the temple tops, and when Pharaoh comes
again I will call it into his ear, till he and all who live in Khem know
thee for what thou art, and see thee in thy naked shame."

She hearkened, and her face grew terrible to see. A moment she stood as
though in thought, one hand pressed to her brow and one upon her breast.
Then she spoke.

"Is that thy last word, Wanderer?"

"It is my last word, Queen," he answered, and turned to go.

Then with the hand that rested on her breast she rent her night robes
and tore her perfumed hair. Past him she rushed towards the door, and as
she ran sent scream on scream echoing up the painted walls.

The curtains shook, the doors were burst asunder, and through them
poured guards, eunuchs, and waiting-women.

"Help," she cried, pointing to the Wanderer. "Help, help! oh, save mine
honour from this evil man, this foreign thief whom Pharaoh set to guard
me, and who guards me thus. This coward who dares to creep upon me--the
Queen of Khem--even as I slept in Pharaoh's bed!" and she cast herself
upon the floor and threw her hair about her, and lay there groaning and
weeping as though in the last agony of shame.

Now when the guards saw how the thing was, a great cry of rage and shame
went up from them, and they rushed upon the Wanderer like wolves upon a
stag at bay. But he leapt backwards to the side of the bed, and even as
he leapt he set the arrow in his hand upon the string of the great black
bow. Then he drew it to his ear. The bow-string sang, the arrow rushed
forth, and he who stood before it got his death. Again the bow-string
sang, again the arrow rushed, and lo! another man was sped. A third time
he drew the bow and the soul of a third went down the ways of hell. Now
they rolled back from him as the waters roll from a rock, for none dares
face the shafts of death. They shot at him with spears and arrows from
behind the shelter of the pillars, but none of these might harm him, for
some fell from his mail and some he caught upon his buckler.

Now among those who had run thither at the sound of the cries of
Meriamun was that same Kurri, the miserable captain of the Sidonians,
whose life the Wanderer had spared, and whom he had given to the Queen
t