I followed, and, presently, skirting the crowd, we came unseen to a little side entrance that led to a stair, up which we passed.  The stair ended in a passage; we turned down it till we found a door on the left hand.  Charmion entered silently, and I followed her into a dark chamber.  Being in, she barred the door and, kindling tinder to a flame, lit a hanging lamp.  As the light grew strong I gazed around.  The chamber was not large, and had but one casement, closely shuttered.  For the rest, it was simply furnished, having white walls, some chests for garments, an ancient chair, what I took to be a tiring table, on which were combs, perfumes, and all the frippery that pertains to woman, and a white bed with a broidered coverlid, over which was hung a gnat-gauze.

“Be seated, Harmachis,” she said, pointing to the chair.  I took the chair, and Charmion, throwing back the gnat-gauze, sat herself upon the bed before me.

“Knowest thou what I heard Cleopatra say as thou didst leave the banqueting-hall?” she asked presently.

“Nay, I know not.”

“She gazed after thee, and, as I went over to her to do some service, she murmured to herself:  ’By Serapis, I will make an end!  I will wait no longer:  to-morrow he shall be strangled!’”

“So!” I said, “it may be; though, after all that has been, I can scarce believe that she will murder me.”

“Why canst thou not believe it, thou most foolish of men?  Dost forget how nigh thou wast to death there in the Alabaster Hall?  Who saved thee then from the knives of the eunuchs?  Was it Cleopatra?  Or was it I and Brennus?  Stay, I will tell thee.  Thou canst not yet believe it, because, in thy folly, thou dost not think it possible that the woman who has but lately been as a wife to thee can now, in so short a time, doom thee to be basely done to death.  Nay, answer not—­I know all; and I tell thee this:  thou hast not measured the depth of Cleopatra’s perfidy, nor canst thou dream the blackness of her wicked heart.  She had surely slain thee in Alexandria had she not feared that thy slaughter being noised abroad might bring trouble on her.  Therefore has she brought thee here to kill thee secretly.  For what more canst thou give her?  She has thy heart’s love, and is wearied of thy strength and beauty.  She has robbed thee of thy royal birthright and brought thee, a King, to stand amidst the waiting-women behind her at her feasts; she has won from thee the great secret of the holy treasure!”

“Ah, thou knowest that?”

“Yes, I know all; and to-night thou seest how the wealth stored against the need of Khem is being squandered to fill up the wanton luxury of Khem’s Macedonian Queen!  Thou seest how she has kept her oath to wed thee honourably.  Harmachis—­at length thine eyes are open to the truth!”

“Ay, I see too well; and yet she swore she loved me, and I, poor fool, I believed her!”