Thus I spent two months, and should have stayed longer had not messengers reached me from the Prince saying that he desired my return. Of these, one followed within three days of the other, and his words were:
“Think you, Scribe Ana, that because I am no more Prince of Egypt I am no longer to be obeyed? If so, bear in mind that the gods may decree that one day I shall grow taller than ever I was before, and then be sure that I will remember your disobedience, and make you shorter by a head. Come swiftly, my friend, for I grow lonely, and need a man to talk with.”
To which I replied, that I returned as fast as the barge would carry me, being so heavily laden with the manuscripts that I had copied and purchased.
So I started, being, to tell truth, glad to get away, for this reason. Two nights before, when I was walking alone from the great temple of the house, a woman dressed in many colours appeared and accosted me as such lost ones do. I tried to shake her off, but she clung to me, and I saw that she had drunk more than enough of wine. Presently she asked, in a voice that I thought familiar, if I knew who was the officer that had come to Thebes on the business of some Royal One and abode in the dwelling that was known as House of the Prince. I answered that his name was Ana.
“Once I knew an Ana very well,” she said, “but I left him.”
“Why?” I asked, turning cold in my limbs, for although I could not see her face because of a hood she wore, now I began to be afraid.
“Because he was a poor fool,” she answered, “no man at all, but one who was always thinking about writings and making them, and another came my way whom I liked better until he deserted me.”
“And what happened to this Ana?” I asked.
“I do not know. I suppose he went on dreaming, or perhaps he took another wife; if so, I am sorry for her. Only, if by chance it is the same that has come to Thebes, he must be wealthy now, and I shall go and claim him and make him keep me well.”
“Had you any children?” I asked.