City of Dreams (17 page)

The wide door of the stall, which the sackers would open outwards when the time came to make use of the grain within, was bolted shut. As Huy came closer, he noticed something glinting in the half light, not quite halfway up the door and towards its centre. Suddenly his heart beat faster and he quickened his pace, in the grip of dreadful panic. The dull reflection came from a gold finger ring. Four fingers were thrust, gripping, through a gap between the planks of the door. Huy touched them. They might have been made of stone. He recognised the ring.

He turned round in an instant, but the silence of the granary mocked him: he was alone. Pulling the heavy bolt of the door, he stood back to allow the weight of the grain to open it, then, working with frantic haste, swung it wider, and, grabbing one of the shovels, began to dig. He seemed to be moving through mud, his actions hampered as if in a dream. He slipped and stumbled on the grain, sinking into it. As fast as he dug, more tiny oval ears tumbled into the hole he had made, in their thousands. But at last he reached the body.

Merymose lay on his back. Barley filled his eyes, his nostrils and his mouth. His fingernails were broken and bloody from when he had thrown himself at the door and torn at it, in the moment when he realised that he had been shut into the stall, and what was going to happen next.

NINE

‘Why? Because Kenamun has lost his best man, and I have no faith in his ability to solve this on his own. Nor, to judge from their efforts, do I see that I have much more to expect from my own people. You will get all the help you want, though I suspect you will be better off working alone. I will pay you in whatever goods you request, at the rate of half a
deben
of silver a day. I will allow you twenty days. If you have not solved this by then, you will be dismissed. If you have, I will buy the house you live in and give it to you.’

Huy looked round the bleak room, unable to believe he was in it again. He had spoken to no one about his discovery of Merymose’s body, not even to Taheb, who was distracted by the preparations for her reluctant departure, and had not questioned him when he told her that Merymose had not appeared at their meeting place.

The news of the policeman’s death came soon afterwards — the sleeping watchman had found the body when he made his evening rounds. But by that time Taheb had already embarked.

Huy had returned to his house in order to work out a way of getting into the brothel known by the impious name of the Glory of Set — Nebamun had been right, he found that he simply could not let the whole thing drop, and now there was a friend’s death to be avenged — when the message had come for him from the palace compound.

‘I am waiting,’ came sternly from the other side of the table. But was there an unsteadiness in the voice? Was Ipuky as sure of himself as he seemed?

Huy looked across at the Controller of the Silver Mines. 

They were both sitting, this time, though the man’s austerity had relaxed very little further than that. What he was offering was something which Huy had hoped for, though the source was surprising. He looked into the severe face again, noting details. Lines at the corners of the mouth indicated that it might have smiled once, but there was no doubt that the eyes were anxious. There was no sign of grief for his daughter, but then, the house was in a state of permanent mourning.

‘What made you approach me?’ Huy asked him. ‘Merymose was not a fool; and you made a good impression when we first met. Now; your answer.’

‘I accept.’

‘Good. Not that you could have refused.’

‘Oh?’

‘You need the work. More importantly, you need Merymose’s killer. Thirdly, if you had refused, I would have told you I intended to point out to Kenamun that the door of the stall in which Merymose was found had been opened. The significance of that doesn’t seem to have occurred to him.’

Huy said nothing.

‘He’s a clever man,’ continued Ipuky; ‘and as devious as a politician needs to be. But he isn’t a detective.’

‘There is something I must ask,’ said Huy.

‘Yes?’

‘I do not know if you will like it.’

Ipuky sat back, folded his hands, and looked at Huy questioningly.

‘I need to know more about you.’

Ipuky’s face tightened. ‘How is that necessary?’

‘You want me to find Iritnefert’s killer.’

‘You find that unnatural in her father?’

‘No. But I imagine you know what is said about you.’

‘What is said about me,’ repeated Ipuky drily. Huy could not tell the thoughts behind the words. There was a long silence before Ipuky continued, ‘What is said about me should not concern you. I am content to let you form your own judgment of my character. Not that my motives should bother you.’ He made to rise, in order to conclude the interview. Huy knew at once that he was entering territory that was dangerous and interesting. He kept his own voice even.

‘That isn’t enough.’

His interlocutor raised his eyebrows a fraction, but remained seated.

‘I cannot proceed at all without your cooperation, and without your trust I will have no light in this darkness.’ Huy did not say that he was not prepared to exchange trust for trust with Ipuky. Hiring Huy would be a very effective way of keeping him under observation, and neutralising the effectiveness of his investigation. But why would a man like Ipuky go to such lengths, when, if he felt that Huy was a threat, he could so easily have him killed?

‘You’d better ask your questions,’ said Ipuky sourly, after a pause.

‘I want to talk to you about your children.’

‘I have already told you, they are too young.’ But one runnel of sweat began to trickle down his forehead from under his headdress.

‘I mean Iritnefert’s brothers.’

Ipuky sighed, flexing his hands as they lay at the edge of the table, and was silent for a long time.

‘They are dead.’

‘Are you sure?’

‘Yes.’

‘Then why are you so worried?’

At last Ipuky met his eye. Now he made no attempt to banish his feelings from his face. ‘Because I am
not
sure,’ he said at last. ‘You obviously know about my sons. I do not know how I can have fathered such children. No one will believe this, and I know exactly what the town says about me, but I loved Iritnefert. I am a man who destroys the women he lives with. My first wife left me, and she was right to do so, but I kept the child I cared about from her. Since I married again, I have had more children, but my second wife has turned into a shadow.’ He fell silent, looking into himself. Huy waited.

‘To my little children I am a shadow also. Even to myself I have become hollow.’ He spread his arms. ‘The blows life deals you make you stronger; but there comes a time when, if the blows do not stop, they begin to weaken even the strongest.’

‘Your sons?’

‘They are my punishment; but I do not know what I am being punished for. Why did Osiris have Set for a brother? Is it possible to carry evil within us, like a disease we transmit but like to think we do not suffer from ourselves?’ Again he paused, wearily, but now that he had started to talk something like relief entered his eyes and his voice. He wet his lips and swallowed before continuing.

‘I do not like to mention their names. To speak them perpetuates them. But I must. Three years separated the boys. Paheri was the older, poor Menna the younger. I had such hopes for them, and was even pleased when, at the age of seven, Paheri asked to enter the priesthood. Of course it was too early in his life to be certain that the gods had called him, but I could have wished for no better career for him than that of a priest-administrator. His resolve did not falter. But there were other things. When he was ten, he caught his younger brother stealing dates. For this transgression, he…’ Ipuky’s voice faltered. ‘No, I will not tell you. Menna was never well in his head or heart — Tawaret did not smile on his birth, and the torture he experienced at his brother’s hands pushed him forever into a lonely land inside himself…’ Again the gaunt man broke off. The room seemed to have become darker. Huy did not move.

‘Paheri never once looked at a woman, though of course by thirteen we were hoping to match him. At first we thought he would grow out of his phobia. Two years later, he entered the priesthood, attached to Surere. They stayed together throughout the reign of the Great Criminal, until the end.’

‘What happened?’

‘Paheri had a row with him. Paheri was furiously jealous. Of anyone. Of anything. Above all, his dislike of women developed into a hatred. Woman had contaminated Man ever since Nut first bent over Geb. That was the image that obsessed him: Nut, bent over across the sky, swallowing the sun, trapping Geb under her. I believe Surere encouraged him in this. His mother was the only exception. The woman who had let him out of the darkness of the birth-cave into the light.’

‘What happened to Menna?’ Huy spoke into the silence.

Ipuky looked up at him. ‘I think he is dead, now. For a long time I was afraid that he had survived the raids of the Khabiris on our last outposts in the north; but an infantry captain who had known him managed to make his way back to the Southern Capital and contacted my steward. He handed over a ring and an amulet that I recognised. I had given them to Menna when he first left to take up his post. He seemed to recover considerably after Paheri left home. I had to try to give him a chance to be independent. The job I found him was an undemanding clerical one. The governor was an old acquaintance, who knew of my son’s shortcomings.’

‘And Paheri?’

Ipuky’s voice was calm. ‘He believed in the Aten ferociously. When it was certain that the City of the Horizon would collapse, and all that it stood for, I wrote to him, to try to get him to save himself. He returned my letter spattered with his own blood, and a reply. In it he told me that the blood he had spilt over my traitor’s proposal — his own blood — was nothing to the blood of the traitors that he would shed if the Aten fell, and it was his lot to take vengeance.’

‘There was nothing but love in the teaching of the Aten,’ said Huy quietly.

‘There are causes, and there are warriors for causes,’ replied Ipuky, his voice as empty as the desert.

‘Why do you think he is here?’

Ipuky looked at him again. ‘Because of the killings. I want you to find him.’

‘But Iritnefert was his own sister.’

‘You do not know my son.’

There was a long silence, during which neither man looked at the other.

‘I will need free access to the palace compound. I will need to be able to go anywhere without being stopped,’ said Huy at last.

‘See my quartermaster. You may wear my livery. That will guarantee that the guards at the gates let you through. I will tell my steward that I am taking you on to the staff as — ‘ he paused for thought for a moment ‘ — as a tax consultant. The assessors will be working on last autumn’s crop soon enough, and the job will ensure that no one in the household asks any questions. You will also be able to come and go without anyone feeling the need to see you receiving direct orders from me.’ He gathered his robe about him. ‘And now — ‘

‘There is one last thing,’ said Huy.

Ipuky returned to his seat. ‘Yes?’

‘I need access to the Glory of Set.’

‘What?’ said Ipuky, sharply.

‘To the brothel, the Glory of Set.’

Ipuky sat back. ‘I do not know what you are talking about.’

Huy was taken aback. Why should Ipuky tell such a transparent lie? Ipuky must have read his thought in his eyes, for he quickly qualified what he had said by adding, ‘I do not see how that can have any bearing on who killed Iritnefert. Surely, after all I have told you, you must see that.’

‘Let me explain.’

The tall man leant forward, hands clasped, an expression of anxiety suddenly naked again on his face. ‘Surely you are not suggesting that my daughter — ? I know she was a wild spirit, but — ‘

‘No,’ Huy reassured him. ‘I do not think so. But there may be a connection.’ He explained, briefly, about Isis.

‘I have never been there, and I do not know who does; but it is powerfully protected,’ Ipuky said wearily. ‘You must forgive me for not being more helpful. For some years now I have not been much in society. I have preferred books and silence for company. In any case, what excuse could I possibly invent for you to go there?’

‘Nevertheless, I need to go. There are questions I must ask there.’

Ipuky looked scornful. ‘And do you think they will answer them?’

‘If they are paid.’ 

Ipuky shook his grey head. The dull gold in his headdress shimmered as it caught the light. ‘They will never tell you. They are already paid, more than any bribe could tempt them, to be discreet. The clients of that place are among the most powerful men and women in the Southern Capital. Even Horemheb has failed to have it closed.’

‘Maybe I can find a lever for Horemheb to do so. And if I can, then it would be a lever you could hand to him.’

‘I am no longer interested in politics,’ said Ipuky. ‘But I am interested to see where your cunning takes you, and you must do anything you think necessary to stop the horror that has begun. Come back tomorrow at this time.’

Huy stood up, bowed briefly to his new master, and made for the doorway. As he reached it Ipuky called to him once more.

‘You think I am as cold as stone,’ he said. ‘Many do. That is my protection. But I must know who killed my daughter. Find him, Huy, and when you have, bring him to me. Death would be too kind an end for a man who has done what he has, and I do not want him to escape into it.’

The Controller of the Silver Mines laid his arms on the table in front of him and clasped his hands together, sinking his head. Huy looked down at him and fired a last question: ‘Have you seen Surere?’

Ipuky looked up, but his face remained rigid. If anything was detectable there, it was surprise. ‘I had done with him years ago.’

‘Perhaps he has not done with you.’

‘Awaken us from this nightmare, Huy. Soon.’

‘I will,’ said Huy. Ipuky’s confession had lit a bright torch in the dark labyrinth of his investigation.

Since Merymose’s death, Huy had carried a dagger. It was an old thing he had had for years but only recently learnt to use, taught by one of the boatswains in Taheb’s fleet. Its blade was two-edged, and made of heavy bronze, the grooves chased like lotus stems. It was fitted into an antelope-horn hilt carved at the top with the Beast’s head. That night, when he awoke in the full certainty that someone else was in the room, he reached for it, where it usually lay by his headrest; but he had barely moved before he felt its point at his throat.