The Pharaoh
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weakness, every ingenuity and play of love: she should be taught all these things. The most subtle ministers should assist her; the most skilled priests of Aphrodite should reveal their greatest secrets and their most voluptuous arts. He would sacrifice heavily to the goddess whose true art could make the strongest men pliable as wax. Perhaps the oracle had not deceived him. He could, at least, fit this girl for the smile of the gods and the weakness of men . . . More than one kingdom had balanced on a woman's smile.
***
The Roman's cool voice aroused him.
"Thou shouldst rejoice, with thy guests, at the birth of thy daughter. I drink her health, and thine."
"For that, I thank thee. Didst thou know?—The oracles say she shall rule
