Ra laughs off the jibe, but inwardly laments Geb's insolence.

Thus, bit by bit, is his morning's happiness whittled.

There are other visitors to the Solar Barque during the course of the day. Minor members of the pantheon, lesser gods, a few demons. Ra receives them all civilly, as a ruler must. They are offered hospitality — sweetmeats and wine. There is idle chat. These duties bore Ra and tire him, but he tries not to let it show.

Thoth, his vizier, his dear old friend, he is always glad to see. The two of them repair to the stern, where only Maat may overhear their conversation.

''Tell me something to lift my mood,'' Ra asks of Thoth.

''You are not dead, Ra,'' comes the reply. ''However dull and dim your life becomes, oblivion is worse. Never forget that.''

''Ha!'' Ra is almost amused. ''I feel a chill, though. Why is that?''

''We are nearing the river's end,'' says Thoth. ''The day is dwindling. Perhaps it is just the cool of the oncoming evening.''

''No. No, I think not. It is a chill inside. A prickling in my heart. A cold presentiment. I fear, Thoth. I fear for the future, and don't know why.''

Thoth beetles his hoary eyebrows. ''We are old, you and I, Ra. Time grows short for us. The future is a strange monster. The less there is of it, the more it frightens.''

''Is that all this is? An intimation of death?''

''Only you can know for certain, old friend.''

Thoth leaves Ra pondering.

Finally, late in the day, the squabbling siblings come. They are the inheritors, the ones to whom the earth was given whole and who have carved it up between them, parcelling it into separate dominions.

Osiris and Isis arrive hand in hand, giddy as newly-weds for all that they have been married for eons. Nephthys is with them, and only reluctantly leaves Isis's side to join Set. She much prefers the company of her sister to that of her brother-husband, who greets her coldly as she approaches and who places an arm around her shoulders much as a farmer might place a yoke on an ox's neck. Nephthys simpers in his embrace like a dutiful wife but in her eyes there is a yearning to be elsewhere.