The Pharaoh was somebody of inferior birth, half-brother--she is called
'Royal Sister,' you remember--son of one of the Pharaoh's slave-women,
perhaps. Odd that she never mentioned him in the tomb. It looks as
though they didn't get on in life, and that she was determined to have
done with him in death. Those were the rings upon that hand, were they
not?"
He replaced them on the fingers, then took off one, a royal signet in a
cartouche, and read the inscription on the other: "'Bes Ank, Ank Bes.'
'Bes the Living, the Living Bes.'
"Your Ma-Mee had some human vanity about her," he added. "Bes, among
other things, as you know, was the god of beauty and of the adornments
of women. She wore that ring that she might remain beautiful, and that
her dresses might always fit, and her rouge never cake when she was
dancing before the gods. Also it fixes her period pretty closely, but
then so do other things. It seems a pity to rob Ma-Mee of her pet ring,
does it not? The royal signet will be enough for us."
With a little bow he gave the hand back to Smith, leaving the Bes ring
on the finger that had worn it for more than three thousand years. At
least, Smith was so sure it was the Bes ring that at the time he did not
look at it again.
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