beast-men who shambled on Earth in primal days. They accorded worship to the Elder One who is known to myth as Nyarlathotep, the “Mighty Messenger.” This abominable deity was said to confer wizard’s power upon receiving human sacrifices; and while the evil priests reigned supreme they temporarily transformed the religion of Egypt into a bloody shambles. With anthropomancy and necrophilism they sought terrible boons from their demons.
The tale goes that Nephren-Ka, on the throne, renounced all religion save that of Nyarlathotep. He sought the power of prophecy, and built temples to the Blind Ape of Truth. His utterly atrocious sacrifices at length provoked a revolt, and it is said that the infamous Pharaoh was at last dethroned. According to this account, the new ruler and his people immediately destroyed all vestiges of the former reign, demolished all temples and idols of Nyarlathotep, and drove out the wicked priests who prostituted their faith to the carnivorous Bubastis, Anubis, and Sebek. The Book of the Dead was then amended so that all references to the Pharaoh Nephren-Ka and his accursed cults were deleted.
Thus, argues the legend, the furtive faith was lost to reputable history. As to Nephren-Ka himself, a strange account is given of his end.
The story ran that the dethroned Pharaoh fled to a spot adjacent to what is now the modern city of Cairo. Here it was his intention to embark with his remaining followers for a “westward isle.” Historians believe that this “isle” was Britain, where some of the fleeing priests of Bubastis actually settled.
But the Pharaoh was attacked and surrounded, his escape blocked. It was then that he had constructed a secret underground tomb, in which he caused himself and his followers to be interred alive. With him, in this vivisepulture, he took all his treasure and magical secrets, so that nothing would remain for his enemies to profit by. So cleverly did his remaining devotees contrive this secret crypt that the attackers were never able to discover the resting-place of the Black Pharaoh.
Thus the legend rests. According to common currency, the fable was handed down by the few remaining priests who actually stayed on the surface to seal the secret place; they and their descendants were believed to have perpetuated the story and the old faith of evil.
Following up this exceedingly unusual story, Cartaret delved into the old tomes of the time. During a trip to London he was fortunate enough to be allowed an inspection of the unhallowed and archaic Necronomicon of Abdul Alhazred. In it were further emendations. One of his influential friends in the Home Office, hearing of his interest, managed to obtain for him a portion of Ludvig Prinn’s evil and blasphemous De Vermis Mysteriis, known more familiarly to students of recondite arcana as Mysteries of the Worm. Here, in that greatly disputed chapter on oriental myth entitled Saracenic Rituals, Cartaret found still more concrete elaborations of the Nephren- Ka tale.
Prinn, who consorted with the mediaeval seers and prophets of Saracen times in Egypt, gave a good deal of prominence to the whispered hints of Alexandrian necromancers and adepts. They knew the story of Nephren-Ka, and alluded to him as the Black Pharaoh.
Prinn’s account of the Pharaoh’s death was much more elaborate. He claimed that the secret tomb lay directly beneath Cairo itself, and professed to believe that it had been opened and reached. He hinted at the cult- survival mentioned in the popular tales; spoke of a renegade group of descendants whose priestly ancestors had interred the rest alive. They were said to perpetuate the evil faith, and to act as guardians of the dead Nephren-Ka and his buried brethren, lest some interloper discover and violate his resting-place in the crypt. After the regular cycle of seven thousand years, the Black Pharaoh and his band would then arise once more, and restore the dark glory of the ancient faith.
The crypt itself, if Prinn is to be believed, was a most unusual place. Nephren-Ka’s servants and slaves had builded him a mighty sepulcher, and the burrows were filled with the rich treasure of his reign. All of the sacred images were there, and the jeweled books of esoteric wisdom reposed within.
Most peculiarly did the account dwell on Nephren-Ka’s search for the Truth and the Power of Prophecy. It was said that before he died down in the darkness, he conjured up the earthly image of Nyarlathotep in a final gigantic sacrifice; and that the god granted him his desires. Nephren-Ka had stood before the images of the Blind Ape of Truth and received the gift of divination over the gory bodies of a hundred willing victims. Then, in nightmare manner, Prinn recounts that the entombed Pharaoh wandered among his dead companions and inscribed on the twisted walls of his tomb the secrets of the future. In pictures and ideographs he wrote the history of days to come, revelling in omniscient knowledge till the end. He scrawled the destinies of kings to come; painted the triumphs and the dooms of unborn empires. Then, as the blackness of death shrouded his sight, and palsy wrenched the brush from his fingers, he betook himself in peace to his sarcophagus, and there died.
So said Ludvig Prinn, he that consorted with ancient seers. Nephren-Ka lay in his buried burrows, guarded by the priestly cult that still survived on Earth, and further protected by enchantments in his tomb below. He had fulfilled his desires at the end — he had known Truth, and written the lore of the future on the nighted walls of his own catacomb.
Cartaret had read all this with conflicting emotions. How he would like to find that tomb, if it existed! What a sensation — he would revolutionize anthropology, ethnology!
Of course, the legend had its absurd points. Cartaret, for all his research, was not superstitious. He didn’t believe the bogus balderdash about Nyarlathotep, the Blind Ape of Truth, or the priestly cult. That part about the gift of prophecy was sheer drivel.
Such things were commonplace. There were many savants who had attempted to prove that the pyramids, in their geometrical construction, were archeological and architectural prophecies of days to come. With elaborate and convincing skill, they attempted to show that, symbolically interpreted, the great tombs held the key to history, that they allegorically foretold the Middle Ages, the Renaissance, the Great War.
This, Cartaret believed, was rubbish. And the utterly absurd notion that a dying fanatic had been gifted with prophetic power and scrawled the future history of the world on his tomb as a last gesture before death — that was impossible to swallow.
Nevertheless, despite his skeptical attitude, Captain Cartaret wanted to find the tomb, if it existed. He had returned to Egypt with that intention, and immediately set to work. So far he had a number of clues and hints. If the machinery of his investigation did not collapse, it was now only a matter of days before he would discover the actual entrance to the spot itself. Then he intended to enlist proper Governmental aid and make his discovery public to all.
This much he now told the silent Arab who had come out of the night with a strange proposal and a weird credential: the Seal of the Black Pharaoh, Nephren-Ka.
When Cartaret finished his summary, he glanced at the dark stranger in interrogation.
“What next?” he asked.
“Follow me,” said the other, urbanely. “I shall lead you to the spot you seek.”
“Now?” gasped Cartaret. The other nodded.
“But — it’s too sudden! I mean, the whole thing is like a dream. You come out of the night, unbidden and unknown, show me the Seal, and graciously offer to grant me my desires. Why? It doesn’t make sense.”
“This makes sense.” The grave Arab indicated the black Seal.
“Yes,” admitted Cartaret. “But — how can I trust you? Why must I go now? Wouldn’t it be wiser to wait, and get the proper authorities behind us? Won’t there be need of excavation; aren’t there necessary instruments to take?”
“No.” The other spread his palms upward. “Just come.”
“Look here.” Cartaret’s suspicion crystallized in his sharp tones. “How do I know this isn’t a trap? Why should you come to me this way? Who the devil are you?”
“Patience.” The dark man smiled. “I shall explain all. I have listened to your accounts of the ‘legend’ with great interest, and while your facts are clear, your own view of them is mistaken. The ‘legend’ you have learned of is true — all of it. Nephren-Ka did write the future on the walls of his tomb when he died; he did possess the power of divination; and the priests who buried him formed a cult which did survive.”
“Yes?” Cartaret was impressed, despite himself.
“I am one of those priests.” The words stabbed like swords in the white man’s brain.
“Do not look so shocked. It is the truth. I am a descendant of the original cult of Nephren-Ka, one of those inner initiates who have kept the legend alive. I worship the Power which the Black Pharaoh received, and I worship the god Nyarlathotep who accorded that Power to him. To us believers, the most sacred truth lies in the hieroglyphs
