Katuti quailed before him, and drew back, but he followed her, seized
her arm, and said huskily:

"What did he say?"

"Paaker!" cried the widow in pain and indignation. "Let me go. It is
better for you that I should not repeat the words with which Rameses
sought to turn Nefert's heart from you. Let me go, and remember to whom
you are speaking."

But Paaker gripped her elbow the tighter, and urgently repeated his
question.

"Shame upon you!" cried Katuti, "you are hurting me; let me go! You will
not till you have heard what he said? Have your own way then, but the
words are forced from me! He said that if he did not know your mother
Setchem for an honest woman, he never would have believed you were your
father's son--for you were no more like him than an owl to an eagle."

Paaker took his hand from Katuti's arm. "And so--and so--" he muttered
with pale lips.

"Nefert took your part, and I too, but in vain. Do not take the words
too hardly. Your father was a man without an equal, and Rameses cannot
forget that we are related to the old royal house. His grandfather, his
father, and himself are usurpers, and there is one now living who has a
better right to the throne than he has."

"The Regent Ani!" exclaimed Paaker decisively. Katuti nodded, she went
up to the pioneer and said in a whisper:

"I put myself in your hands, though I know they may be raised against
me. But you are my natural ally, for that same act of Rameses that
disgraced and injured you, made me a partner in the designs of Ani. The
king robbed you of your bride, me of my daughter. He filled your soul
with hatred for your arrogant rival, and mine with passionate regret for
the lost happiness of my child. I feel the blood of Hatasu in my veins,
and my spirit is high enough to govern men. It was I who roused the
sleeping ambition of the Regent--I who directed his gaze to the throne
to which he was destined by the Gods. The ministers of the Gods, the
priests, are favorably disposed to us; we have--"

At this moment there was a commotion in the garden, and a breathless
slave rushed in exclaiming "The Regent is at the gate!"

Paaker stood in stupid perplexity, but he collected himself with an
effort and would have gone, but Katuti detained him.

"I will go forward to meet Ani," she said. "He will be rejoiced to see
you, for he esteems you highly and was a friend of your father's."

As soon as Katuti had left the hall, the dwarf Nemu crept out of his