“I heard your commands, O Holy One, and behold! the mission is fulfilled. Before you appear Rima the Babylonian, daughter of Ditanah the King of Babylon and widow of Kheperra, Pharaoh of Upper Egypt; Lady Kemmah, the royal nurse, your kinswoman, and the royal babe Nefra, Princess of Egypt.”
“I see them, my son, but what of the fourth, the mighty black man, as to whom I gave no command?”
“This, Father: that without his help sent by the gods none of us would be here to-day, seeing that he held the door against traitors and with that axe of his, slew them all, eight in number.”
“Not so, my son, unless my spirit told me falsely, the Lady Kemmah, my kinswoman, slew one of them.”
Now Ru, who had been listening amazed, could contain himself no longer.
“That is right, O Prophet, or O God,” he broke in, in his big voice. “She killed one of them who slipped past me, their captain as I think, with the shrewdest thrust ever driven by a woman’s arm—also another escaped. But your sight must be very good, O Prophet, if you can see from here to Thebes and take note of one blow among so many.”
A faint smile flickered on the face of Roy.
“Come hither, Ru, for so I think you are named,” he said.
The giant obeyed and of his own accord knelt down before Roy, who went on:
“Hearken, Ru the Ethiopian. You are a gallant man and a true-hearted. You slew those who slew your King Kheperra and bore his body from the battle. By your gift of strength and skill in war you saved your lord’s child and the Queen her mother from prison and death. Therefore I number you among our Brotherhood into whose company hitherto no black man has ever entered. Afterwards you shall be instructed in its simpler rites and take the lesser oaths. Yet know, O Ru, that if you betray the smallest of its secrets or work harm to any of your fellow servants of the Dawn, you shall die thus,” and leaning forward he whispered fiercely into the Negro’s ear.