Lah’s voice broke the silence, caressingly, once more.
The creature bounded lightly through the air. The next instant the warrior lay prone on the marble floor, a swift, wide-spreading pool of blood speaking dumbly yet to heaven, of the doom that had fallen. The Queen turned to Agno.
“Behold,” she said, “your answer.”
With a graceful gesture she stopped the rising murmur of the multitude, and again her wonderful voice changed. It hid not the majesty of the speaker; no, truly, it hinted at power to enforce the words, but it was sweet, sweet and persuasive, over and above anything that I have ever heard.
“O my people!” thus spoke the Queen. “When, before to-night, has the highest in the land received an order of him who standeth next unto the throne? When before this hour has the chief servant of the Snake set a limit to the will of her who calls herself, and truly, the Snake’s Bride? Have I not borne the embrace of the holy one, the python? In the dread hour in the pit itself has not the marriage rite been held, and for this?
“Turn, O my people, ere it be too late! The fate of yonder man,” and she pointed to the loose-limbed, weltering form upon the pavement, “the fate of such as he is naught to the vengeance that shall surely fall on him who sets his neck stiffly against the will of her, the best beloved of Hed. Aye! of the highest! I have said it. Look you to it.
“I am Lah, the Queen, and the just gods have given unto the hollow of my hand all power. As for these,” and she turned her beautiful face an instant towards us, “rest quietly. The defamers of the Serpent may not hope for mercy. Nevertheless, in mine own time, and after mine own choosing, shall they pay the penalty.
“Guards, lead the prisoners behind the veil!” She turned smiling to the High Priest.
“More prudence would better befit thy white hairs, most pious Agno,” she said, and the clash of cymbals answering to her nod drowned the bitter answer that writhed upon his lips, and proved that the Queen was, after all, but yet a woman, and so holding fast to the sex’s dear privilege of the final word.
Obedient to Lah’s command, six stalwart negro warriors, gorgeous in loin cloths of scarlet and gold, advanced, and laying hands upon us, hurried us, Lestrade and me, through the gaping multitude, on past the silver screen, by the Queen’s glittering throne, the host of slave girls, the musicians, the courtiers, onward still, until we reached a shimmering network of silk and steel that draped securely an entrance at the back.