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Updated: June 1, 2025
"He does not lie," said the Captain. "I was in the Court of the Great King and heard yonder Shabaka purchase pardon by promising to hand over his cousin, the lady Amada, to the King. The pearls were entrusted to him as a gift to her and I see she wears them. The gold also of which mention has been made was to provide for her journey in state to the East, or so I heard.
Now when she learned how Bes by his wit had saved me from a death of torment in the boat, my mother clapped her hands to summon a servant and sent for Bes, and said to him, "Bes, hitherto I have looked on you as a slave taken by my son, the noble Shabaka, in one of his far journeys that it pleases him to make to fight and to hunt.
Look on it," and taking the ancient White Seal from about my neck, I handed it to him. He looked and the Councillors looked. Then they said almost with one voice, "It is the White Seal, the very signet of the Great Kings of the East," and they bowed before the dreadful thing. "How you came by this we do not know, Shabaka," said Peroa. "That can be inquired of afterwards.
Now we were standing in the clear sunlight, but as I said the words a wind stirred the palm-trees and the shadow from one of them fell full upon me, and she who was very quick, noted it. "Some might take that for an omen," she said with a little laugh, pointing to the line of the shadow. "Oh! Shabaka, if you have aught to confess, say it now and I will forgive it.
"Oh! not here," she said, "not here in the presence of this Holy One who watches all that passes in heaven and earth." "Then perchance, Amada, she has watched the freeing of Egypt on yonder field to-day, and knows for whose sake it was done." "Hearken, Shabaka. I am your guerdon. Moreover as a woman I am yours. There is naught I desire so much as to feel your kiss upon me.
"As this dog who wears the robe of women said" here the King laughed, but the eunuch, Houman, turned green with rage and glowered at me "my name is Shabaka. I am a descendant of the Ethiopian king of Egypt of that same name." "It seems from all I hear that there are too many descendants of kings in Egypt.
Only to-day I have seen a meeting between Pharaoh, the holy Tanofir and the lady Amada. They were all disturbed, I know not at what, and the end of it was that Amada wrote in a roll and gave the writing to messengers, who I think even now are speeding southward to you, Shabaka. Nay, do not look doubtfully on me, it is true."
"Bes," he said sternly, "I think you grow dull since you became a king or perhaps it is marriage that makes you so. Why, in bygone years schemes would have come so fast that they would have choked each other between those thick lips of yours. And Shabaka, tell me, have you lost all your generalship whereof once you had plenty, in the soft air of Ethiopia?
Now Bes looked at me and said, "It seems that you had better be gone also, my Brother, with the archers. Perchance the holy Tanofir will show you whither." "No, no," answered Tanofir, "my guides will show him. Look not so doubtful, Shabaka. Did I fail you when you were in the grip of the King of kings in the East, and only your own life and that of Bes were at stake?" "I do not know," I answered.
Or his head in a basket will suffice, since that will save trouble afterwards, also some pain to Shabaka. Why, now I remember. It was this very Shabaka whom the Great King condemned to death by the boat for a crime against his Majesty, and who bought his life by promising to deliver to him the fairest and most learned woman in the world the lady Amada of Egypt.
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