midday
`` But Kenkenes has been a dutiful son , '' he said after a silence , `` I can not think he would use me so cruelly -- no word of his intent or his whereabouts . '' The objection was plausible . `` Then , let us go to Masaarah and discover of a surety , '' the scribe suggested . When Atsu emerged from the mouth of the little valley into the quarries some time after the midday meal , he was confronted by the murket and the royal scribe . Neither of the men was unknown to him . Hotep halted him . `` Was there a guest with the fair-haired Israelite maiden last night ? ''