So, rejoicing at this news which was better than she had expected, Tua kissed her father and left him.
"Now will your Majesty go to bed ?" asked Asti when she had returned to her own apartments.
"By no means," answered Tua, "I wear Pharaoh's shoes and have much business left to do to-night.

Summon Mermes, your husband." So Mermes came and stood before her.

He was still what he had been in the old days when Tua played as an infant in his house, stern, noble-looking and of few words, but now his hair had grown white and his face was drawn with grief, both for the sake of Rames, whose hot blood had brought him into so much danger, and because Pharaoh, who was his friend, lay between life and death.
Tua looked at him and loved him more than ever, for now that he was troubled some new likeness to Rames appeared upon his face which she had never seen before.
"Take heart, noble Mermes," she said gently, "they say that Pharaoh stays with us yet a while." "I thank Amen," he answered, "for had he died, his blood would have been upon the hands of my House." "Not so, Mermes; it would have been upon the hands of the gods.

You spring from a royal line; say, what would you have thought of your son if after being struck by that fat Nubian, he had cowered at his feet and prayed for his life like any slave ?" Mermes flushed and smiled a little, then said: "The question is rather---What would you have thought, O Queen ?" "I ?" answered Tua.

"Well, as a queen I should have praised him much, since then Egypt would have been spared great trouble, but as a woman and a friend I should never have spoken to him again.