“Won’t he tell you his secrets, Uncle Cassius?” she asked.  “He has such an aggravating smile, just as if he were amused at baffling you.”

“I am baffled,” the Dean conceded, genially.  “I’ve reached a certain point and there there is a blank which no historic record seems to fill.  I thought when I had restored the inscription on the urn that it would tell me several of the missing points, but it seems to be merely a sort of sacred invocation.  I am amazed at the urn being hollow.  Every other memorial urn which I found during our excavations in Egypt was sealed, and upon being opened we always found rolls of papyrii within.  I am disappointed.”

Kit went into the back parlor and lifted the urn from the piano very carefully, carrying it out to its customary place on the Dean’s desk.  Then she stood staring at it, reflectively.  It certainly was not exactly a thing of beauty, although, as the Dean had pointed out to her, one saw the influence of Grecian art in its graceful lines.  It always reminded Kit of Indian pottery down among the Zunis and Mexicans.

“What does the inscription say?” Kit leaned forward anxiously.

“It merely traces the origin of King Amenotaph to the god Thoth,” said the Dean, thoughtfully; “that is, the Egyptian Hermes, or Mercury, as we know him, and it is extremely vague, being a curious mixture of the Coptic and the ancient Aramaic.”

“But what does it say?” asked Kit again.

The Dean followed the curious markings on the urn with his finger-tip, bending forward and peering over the rims of his tortoise-shell glasses.

“It says, ’Amenotaph, born of Thoth, shall reign in wisdom.  Kings shall serve at his footstool.  Ra shall shine upon him.  He shall lie in peace, encompassed by Ra.’”

“Is that all?”

“That is all,” sighed the Dean.  “It seems merely a laudatory sentiment.”

“Who was Ra?” asked Kit, curiously, running her hand around the top of the urn.

“The Sun god.  His symbol was the circle.  You see it here.”

Kit repeated again, slowly: 

“‘He shall lie in peace, encompassed by Ra,’ That means surrounded by Ra, doesn’t it, Uncle Cassius?” She picked up the um in both hands and shook it close to her ear.

“My dear child, do be careful,” cried the Dean; “it is priceless.”

But Kit put it under one arm as though it had been a milk pail and tapped around the inside with her knuckles, listening.

“That’s a perfectly good hollow jug,” she said, solemnly.  “Just you tap it, and listen, uncle.  I’ll bet a cookie they’ve hidden something inside the outside and that Ra has guarded it all these years.”

“Just a moment, just a moment, my dear,” exclaimed the Dean, smiling like a happy boy.  “You’ve given me an idea.  This may be a cryptogram, or an ideographic cypher.  Just a moment, now; don’t speak to me.”

He sat down at the desk and figured laboriously for nearly twenty minutes, working out the inscription in cypher, while Kit stared at him delightedly.  After all, it was rather gratifying, she thought, to have somebody in the family who could take a little remark made thousands of years ago in old Egypt and make sense out of it to-day.  She waited patiently until he had finished.  His hands were trembling as he reached for the urn.