At the sudden appearance of their lord and master the latter dropped Bentamen’s arms and commenced dancing, clapping their hands, and sending out upon the quiet morning air the shrill “welcome cry” of their race, in which the beaming Bentamen, Baltu’s spouse, attempted to join. Tears of joy the while dropped in a shower upon the head of her devoted pet.
However, Baltu had no time for greetings. In response to his directions Bentamen, supported by her maids, waddled slowly toward a little kiosk in the rear of the garden, a summer house almost buried in a circle of ragged date and dôm palm. Though in his rough way, Baltu devotedly loved his fat wife, business always consigned her to second place in her lord’s heart.
During this little scene Bhanar had had time to gaze about her. The room in which they stood was decorated with painted designs of hunting scenes, boomerang-hunting amidst the marshes, a common pastime with the wealthier Egyptians. The ceiling decoration consisted of a painted band of spiral grape vines, whose dainty tendrils met and intertwined immediately above her head.
In one corner the artist had introduced a cat crouching to spring upon an unsuspecting field mouse. The latter was busily engaged in eating its way into a fat bunch of luscious purple grapes.
Puns being the Egyptian’s stock in trade, his common form of wit, the artist had scrawled in minute hieroglyphics below: “Oh, guest, whosoever thou art, what do you think of this for a vignette?”
Bhanar, it is true, could not read the inscription, but she could appreciate the charm of the little apartment, its brilliant frescoes and its floors powdered with finest white sand, gold dust, lapis lazuli and turquoise.
A scent as of some sweet pungent incense floated in the air. Scented woods from the Incense Country had been stocked in the center of the little brazier which glowed fitfully at the edge of a low dais hung with richly embroidered linen.
This dais stood well back against the eastern wall of the room. Upon it stood a light wicker-work couch, its head and back of ebony, its four high feet of ivory carved to represent panther’s claws.
Clapping his hands, Baltu gave certain sharp directions to an obsequious Nubian, who appeared as if by magic at his summons. Thereafter Baltu smiled, stroked his long beard and, taking a small bottle of wine from a niche in the wall, shook a few drops into the brazier. He muttered a prayer to Bar, Baal and Isis as he poured out the wine. Could his two hearers have understood his words, they would have heard the old slaver bribe his gods, foreign and Egyptian alike, with promises of rich libations, of oxen and geese, should his bait be taken at the figure he had fixed.