Pentu made no answer, as though he had not heard, and there was a general silence.
"Why are you eating so little, Tuta?" the host inquired solicitously. "This is your favourite dish, antelope from the salty plains. Isn't it cooked to your liking?"
"Oh, yes, prince, it is excellent; I have eaten much of it."
"He is telling fibs—he hasn't had a bite, I have seen myself," the king laughed. "He is grieving over poor Ruru. Haven't they discovered yet who killed it?"
"No, they haven't," Tuta answered in confusion.
"They will soon discover it, I am on the track," Mahu said, looking intently at Tuta.
Tuta was more dead than alive: he took a piece of meat into his mouth and could not swallow it.
"What's the matter with you, stomach-ache again?" his consort, princess Ankhsenbatona, who sat next to him, asked him in a whisper.
"Yes," he answered with the languid air he always assumed when speaking about his health.
Ankhi knew that his stomach-ache was generally due to fear.