He heard. He gathered his last strength. He rose and staggered towards her, striking at the air. Slowly she drew away, while he followed her, awful to see. At length he stood still, he threw up his hands, and fell dead.
Then Meriamun drew near and looked at him strangely.
“Behold the end of Pharaoh,” she said. “That then was a king, upon whose breath the lives of peoples hung like a poised feather. Well, let him go! Earth can spare him, and Death is but the richer by a weary fool. ’Tis done, and well done! Would that to-morrow’s task were also done—and that Helen lay as Pharaoh lies. So—rinse the cup—and now to sleep—if sleep will come. Ah, where hath sleep flown of late? To-morrow they’ll find him dead. Well, what of it? So do kings ofttimes die. There, I will be going; never were his eyes so large and so unlovely!”
Now the light of morning gathered again on all the temple tops, and men rose from sleep to go about their labours. Meriamun watched it grow as she lay sleepless in her golden bed, waiting for the cry that presently should ring along the Palace walls. Hark! What was that? The sound of swinging doors, the rush of running feet. And now it came—long and shrill it rose.
“Pharaoh is dead! Awake! Awake, ye sleepers! Awake! awake! and look upon that which has come about. Pharaoh is dead! Pharaoh is dead!”
Then Meriamun arose, and followed by the ladies, rushed from her chamber.
“Who dreams so evilly?” she said. “Who dreams and cries aloud in his haunted sleep?”
“O Queen, it is no dream,” said one. “Pass into the ante-chamber and see. There lies Pharaoh dead, and with no wound upon him to tell the manner of his end.”
Then Meriamun cried aloud with a great cry, and threw her hair about her face, while tears fell from her dark eyes. She passed into the chamber, and there, fallen on his back and cold, lay Pharaoh in his royal robes. Awhile the Queen looked upon him as one who is dumb with grief. Then she lifted up her voice and cried:
“Still is the curse heavy upon Khem and the people of Khem. Pharaoh lies dead; yea, he is dead who has no wound, and this I say, that he is slain of the witchcraft of her whom men name the Hathor. Oh, my Lord, my Lord!” and kneeling, she laid her hand upon his breast; “by this dead heart of thine I swear that I will wreak thy murder on her who wrought it. Lift him up! Lift up this poor clay, that was the first of kings. Clothe him in the robes of death, and set him on the knees of Osiris in the Temple of Osiris. Then go forth through the city and call out this, the Queen’s command; call it from street to street. This is the Queen’s command, that ‘every woman in Tanis who has lost son, or husband, or brother, or kin or lover, through the witchcraft of the False Hathor, or by the plagues that she hath wrought on Khem, or in the war with the Apura, whom she caused to fly from Khem, do meet me at sundown in the Temple of Osiris before the face of the God and of dead Pharaoh’s Majesty.’”