“Read the writing, Tau,” said Roy, “for my sight grows feeble and I forget this foreign tongue which is your own.”
So Tau took the tablets and read:
“From Ditanah the aged, Lord of Babylon and King of Kings, whose glory is as that of the Sun, the Mighty One. To Roy the holy Seer, the Friend of Heaven, the Prophet of the Order of the Dawn, and to him who sits under Roy, the first of the Brothers of the Dawn, who in Egypt is named Tau, but who, as I, Ditanah, have heard, in Babylon aforetime was named the High Prince Abeshu, the lawful son of my body, with whom I quarrelled because he rebuked my Majesty as to a certain vengeance which I took upon a subject people, and who thereafter fled away and as I believed was long dead—Greetings.
“Know, O Roy, and O Tau or Abeshu, that I have received your letters informing me of all that passes in Egypt, and that you, Abeshu, still live. Also that it was the desire of my daughter Rima whom I gave in marriage to Kheperra, the Pharaoh of the South and by right of descent the King of all Egypt, that her bones should be brought back for burial to Babylon. Also I have read that her daughter Nefra has in secret been crowned Queen of Egypt and seeks my help to win her throne out of the hands of my enemy, Apepi the Usurper who rules at Tanis.
“Now I, Ditanah, say to you, Roy the Holy, and to you, Queen Nefra my grandchild, ‘Come to me at Babylon with all your company. Thither I swear you safe-conduct in the name of my god Marduk, Ruler of Heaven and Earth, in the name of the gods Nebo and Bel, and of all the other gods who are my lords. There, also, you shall be guarded from all harm by the strength of my hands, and there we will talk together of all these matters.’
“And to you who are called Tau, I say, ‘Come also, and if you can prove to me that you are in truth my son, the Prince Abeshu, I will give you all things that you desire, who have mourned over you for many years, save one thing only, the succession to my throne after me which is promised to another. But if you have lied to me in this matter, then do not come, for surely you shall die.’
“To the bones, also, of my daughter Rima, whose husband Kheperra, the wolf, Apepi brought to his death, I will give honourable burial in the sepulchre of kings, where it was her desire to lie at last. Nor do I think that I shall refuse her death-prayer, if Nefra, my grandchild the Queen, will obey me in a certain matter.
“Sealed with the seal of Ditanah, the Great King and with the seals of his Councillors.”
When Tau had read he touched his forehead with the tablet and gave it to Nefra who sat upon her throne in the centre of the Council. She also laid it against her forehead, then turned to Tau and said:
“How comes it, my Lord Tau, that all these years you have kept this secret from me, who if the tale that is written here be true, must be a brother of my mother and my uncle?”—a question which caused the envoys to stare at him.