Hotep was host and these were his guests.
First, there was Rameses, languid, cynical, sumptuous, and enthroned in
a capacious fauteuil, significantly upholstered in purple and gold.
Close beside him and similarly enthroned was Ta-user. She wore a
double robe of transparent linen, very fine and clinging in its
texture. The over-dress was simply a white gauze, striped with narrow
lines of green and gold. From the fillet of royalty about her
forehead, an emerald depended between her eyes. Her zone was a broad
braid of golden cords, girdling her beneath the breast, encompassing
her again about the hips, and fastened at last in front by a
diamond-shaped buckle of clustered emeralds. Her sandals were mere
jeweled straps of white gazelle-hide, passing under the heel and ball
of the foot. She was as daringly dressed as a lissome dancing-girl.
On a taboret at her right was Seti, the little prince. Although he was
nearly sixteen he looked to be of even tenderer years. In him, the
charms of the Egyptian countenance had been so emphasized, and its
defects so reduced, that his boyish beauty was unequaled among his
countrymen.
At his feet was Io, playing at dice with Ta-meri and Nechutes.
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