tly, after he had been sick, Houman recovered enough to
come forward leaning on the shoulders of two guards. Only now he mocked
me no more.

We reached a quay just as the sun was setting. There in charge of a
one-eyed black slave, a little square-ended boat floated at the river's
edge, while on the quay itself lay a similar but somewhat shorter boat,
bottom uppermost. Now the hunters whom I had won in the wager, with many
glances of compassion, for they were brave men and knew that it was I
who had saved their lives, placed the bags of gold in the bottom of the
floating boat, and on the top of these a mattress stuffed with straw.
Then the girdle of rose-hued pearls was made fast about my middle, my
hands were untied, I was seized by the executioners and laid on my back
on the mattress, and my wrists and ankles were fixed by cords to iron
rings that were screwed to the thwarts of the boat. After this the
other, shorter boat was laid over me in such a manner that it did not
touch me, leaving my head, my hands and my feet exposed as the eunuch
had said.

While this wicked work was going forward Bes sat on the quay, watching,
till presently, after I had been made fast and covered up, he burst into
shouts of laughter, clapped his hands and began to dance about as though
with joy, till the eunuch, who had now recovered somewhat from my kick,
grew curious and asked him why he behaved thus.

"O noble Eunuch," he answered, "once I was free and that man made me a
slave, so that for many years I have been obliged to toil for him whom I
hate. Moreover, often he has beaten me and starved me, which was why you
saw me eat so much not long ago, and threatened to kill me, and now at
last I have my revenge upon him who is about to die miserably. That is
why I laugh and sing and dance and clap my hands, O most noble Eunuch,
I who shall become the follower and servant of the glorious King of
all the earth, and perhaps your friend, too, O Eunuch of eunuchs, whose
sacred person my brutal master dared to kick."

"I understand," said Houman smiling, though with a twisted face, "and
will make report of all you say to the King, and ask him to grant that
you shall sometimes prick this Egyptian in the eye. Now go spit in his
face and tell him what you think of him."

So Bes waded into the water which was quite shallow here, and spat into
my face, or pretended to, while amid a torrent of vile language, he
interpolated certain words in the Liby