The Egyptian (40 page)

Abashed I raised my hands and regarded them, and they reminded me most vividly of the feet of a crocodile. We took the shortest way home, spread out our mats, and slept very deeply that night.

Thus began my life in the poor quarter of Thebes. As Kaptah had foretold, I had many patients, and lost more money than I earned. I required many costly medicines, and it was not worth my while to heal the starving if they could not buy enough meal and fat to regain their strength. The gifts I received were of small value though they gave me joy, and even greater joy was it to learn that the poor had begun to bless my name. Every evening the sky over Thebes glowed red with the lights of the inner city. I was weary after my day’s work, and even at night my thoughts were with the sufferings of my patients. I thought also of Aton, Pharaoh’s god.

Kaptah engaged an old woman to keep house for us, a woman who did not disturb me and who was weary of life and of men as her face showed. She cooked well and was quiet and never stood in the porch to insult the poor because of their smell or to drive them away from me with harsh words. I soon grew accustomed to her, and she was never in my way. She was a shadow, and I ceased to notice her. Her name was Muti.

So month followed month. The unrest in Thebes increased, and nothing was heard of Horemheb’s return. The sun scorched the gardens yellow and the hottest part of the summer was at hand. At times I craved a change and went with Kaptah to the Crocodile’s Tail to joke with Merit and look into her eyes, though she remained remote from me and made my heart sore. I listened to the talk of the other customers and soon observed that it was not everyone who was given a seat and a goblet in this house. The customers were picked and chosen, and although some of them might live by grave robbing or blackmail, they forgot their trade when at the tavern and comported themselves in a decent manner. I believed Kaptah when he told me that in this house only such people met as had a use for one another. No one had a use for me, and here also I was a stranger, although I was tolerated and men were not shy of me, because I was Kaptah’s friend.

I heard a great deal here; I heard Pharaoh cursed as well as praised, but his new god was for the most part mocked. But one evening an incense dealer came to the tavern with torn garments and ashes in his hair.

He came to soothe his sorrows with a crocodile’s tail and shouted, “May this false Pharaoh be cursed to all eternity—this bastard, this usurper, who acts according to his own whims, to the detriment of my sacred calling. Hitherto I have made my best profits on materials I obtain from the land of Punt, and the voyages on the Eastern Sea are not at all hazardous. Every summer ships have been fitted out for the trade routes, and during the following year at least two out of every ten ships have returned with no more than a water measure’s delay. Thus I have always been able to make accurate assessment of my holdings and profits. But now! Was there ever greater madness? At the last refit Pharaoh himself came down to the harbor to inspect the fleet. He saw the seamen lamenting aboard the ships and their wives and children weeping on the shore, slashing their faces with sharp stones as is only seemly on such an occasion, for it is well known how many sail and how few return. It has been so ever since the days of the great queen. Nevertheless, believe it or not, this cranky boy, this damned Pharaoh forbade the vessels to sail and has decreed that no more ships are to be fitted out for Punt. Ammon save us! Every honest merchant knows what that means. It means ruin for countless men, poverty and starvation for the wives and children of seamen. Consider the fortunes invested in ships and warehouses, in glass beads and earthenware jars! Think of the Egyptian agents who must now languish forever in the straw huts of the land of Punt, abandoned by the gods!”

Not until the incense dealer had been given the third crocodile’s tail on the flat of his hand did he grow quieter. Then he made haste to beg forgiveness if in his grief and indignation he had uttered disparagement of Pharaoh.

“Yet,” he went on, “I believe Queen Taia, who is a wise and discerning woman, should govern her son better. I believed Eie the priest also to be a sensible man, but they all seek to overthrow Ammon and allow Pharaoh to give free rein to his madness. Poor Ammon! A man commonly comes to his senses once he has broken a jar with a woman and married, but this Nefertiti, this royal consort, thinks only of her clothes and of her indecent fashions. Believe it or not, the women of the court now paint themselves green round the eyes with malachite and go with their robes open from the navel downward in the sight of men.”

Kaptah was curious and said, “I have never seen such fashions in any other land, though I have encountered many curiosities, especially in the matter of women’s dress. Do you mean to tell me that women now walk abroad with their private parts uncovered, the Queen also?”

The incense dealer was offended and replied, “I am a man of decorum, with a wife and children. I did not lower my eyes below the navel, nor would I counsel you to do anything so unbecoming.”

Merit now interposed wrathfully, “It is your own mouth that is shameless and not these new summer fashions, which are wonderfully cool and do full justice to a woman’s beauty, provided she has a fair and well-formed belly and a navel that has not been disfigured by an unskilled midwife. You might safely have allowed your eyes to travel lower, for beneath the open robe there is a narrow loincloth of finest linen that cannot offend the eye of decorum.”

The incense dealer would have liked to reply to this, but the third crocodile’s tail was stronger than his tongue. Therefore he laid his head in his hands and wept bitterly over the dress of the court women and over the fate of the Egyptians abandoned in the land of Punt.

When Kaptah and I were leaving, I said to Merit at the door, “You know that I am alone, and your eyes have told me that you also are alone. I have pondered over the words you once said to me and believe that at times a lie can be sweeter than truth for a solitary person whose first springtime is past. I should like you to wear such a new summer dress as you were speaking of, for you are shapely and your legs are long, and I do not think you will need to be ashamed of your belly when I walk with you along the Avenue of Rams.”

This time she did not put aside my hand but pressed it gently and said, “Perhaps I will do as you suggest.”

Yet her promise gave me no pleasure when I stepped out into the hot evening air; rather I was filled with melancholy. From far out upon the river came the lonely notes of a double-reed pipe.

On the following day Horemheb returned to Thebes and with him an armed force. But to tell of this and of all else that happened, I must begin on a new book. Yet I should first mention that in the course of my practice I twice had occasion to open skulls; one patient was a powerful man and the other a poor woman who believed herself to be the great Queen Hatshepsut. Both recovered and were cured, though I believe the old woman was happier in thinking herself queen than when her reason was restored.

THE summer was it its hottest when Horemheb returned from the land of Kush. The swallows had long vanished into the river mud; the pools about the city stagnated while locusts and flea beetles attacked the crops. But in Thebes the gardens of the wealthy were green and cool and luxuriant, and on either side of the Avenue of Rams flowers bloomed in all the colors of the rainbow. Only the poor lacked water, and their food alone was polluted by the dust that fell everywhere like a net, filming the leaves of the acacias and sycamores in their quarter of the city. Southward, on the farther shore, Pharaoh’s golden house with its walls and gardens rose through the heat haze with the blue, misty glow of a dream. Although the hottest season was now upon us, Pharaoh had not left for his summer palaces in the Lower Kingdom but remained in Thebes. From this everyone knew that something was about to happen. As the heavens darken before a sandstorm, so the hearts of the people were overshadowed with dread.

No one was surprised to see warriors marching into Thebes at dawn on all the southern roads. With dusty shields, gleaming copper spearheads, and strung bows the black troops marched along the streets and stared about them in wonder, the whites of their eyes flashing in their sweaty faces. They followed their barbarous standards into the empty barracks, where cooking fires soon began to blaze and stones were heated to put in the great earthenware cauldrons. Meanwhile, ships of the fleet were berthing alongside the quays, and the chariots and plumed horses of the officers were put ashore from the transports. There were no Egyptians to be seen among these troops, who were for the most part Nubians from the south and Shardanas from the desert in the northwest. They occupied the city; watch fires were kindled at the street corners, and the river was closed. Gradually in the course of the day labor ceased in workshop and mill, in office and warehouse. The merchants carried in their goods from the street and barred their shutters, and the keepers of taverns and pleasure houses hurried to hire sturdy fellows with cudgels to protect their premises. The people arrayed themselves in white and began to stream from all quarters of the city toward the great temple of Ammon, until its courts were crammed and many were gathered outside the walls.

Meanwhile the word flew round that during the night the temple of Aton had been defiled and desecrated. The rotting carcass of a dog had been thrown on the altar, and the watchman had been found with his throat slit from ear to ear. When the people heard this they shot sidelong glances of fear, but many could not refrain from secret jubilation.

“Cleanse your instruments, lord,” said Kaptah gravely. “I believe that before nightfall there will be much work for you to do. If I do not mistake, you will be opening skulls also.”

Yet nothing noteworthy took place before the evening; a few drunken Nubians plundered shops and raped a couple of women. The guards seized them, and they were flogged in the sight of the people, which brought little consolation either to the merchants or to the women. Hearing that Horemheb was aboard the commander’s ship, I went to the harbor, though with little hope of speech with him. The guard heard me with indifference and went to announce my arrival, then to my surprise returned to summon me to the captain’s cabin. Thus for the first time I boarded a warship and looked about me with great curiosity, yet only the armament and the more numerous crew distinguished it from other vessels, since merchantmen also had gilded bows and colored sails.

So once more I encountered Horemheb. He seemed to me even taller and of greater dignity than before; his shoulders were broad, and the muscles of his arms powerful. But there were lines in his face, and his eyes were bloodshot and weary. I bowed low before him and stretched forth my hands at knee level.

He exclaimed with a bitter laugh, “See, it is Sinuhe, the Son of the Wild Ass! In truth you come at an auspicious hour!”

He did not embrace me because of his dignity, but turned to a fat, pop-eyed little officer who stood beside him panting in the heat. Horemheb handed him his golden whip of office saying, “Here it is, then—take charge!” Removing his gold-embroidered collar, he set it about potbelly’s neck and added, “Assume command, and may the blood of the people flow over your filthy hands.” Then he turned abruptly to me.

“Sinuhe, my friend, I am free to go with you wherever you will, and I hope you have a mat in your house where I can stretch my bones, for by Set and all devils I am mortally weary of arguing with maniacs.”

He then laid his hands on the shoulders of the little officer, who was a head shorter than himself, and said, “Look well upon him, friend Sinuhe, and impress what you see upon your memory, for here is a man in whose hands lies the destiny of Thebes this day. Pharaoh put him in my place when I told Pharoah he was mad. And having seen him you may readily surmise that Pharoah will soon have need of me again!”

He laughed and smote his knees, but there was no mirth in his laughter; it frightened me. The little officer looked at him meekly, his eyes popping with the heat and the sweat running down his face and neck and between his fat breasts.

“Be not angry with me, Horemheb,” he said in a high voice. “You know that I have not coveted your whip of office; I prefer my cats and the peace of my garden to the din of war. But who am I to set myself against the commands of Pharaoh? And he declares that there will be no war, but that the false god shall fall without bloodshed.”

“He declares the thing he hopes for,” answered Horemheb. “His heart runs ahead of his reason as a bird outstrips a snail, so that his words have no weight. You should think for yourself and shed blood moderately, with due consideration, even though it may be the blood of Egyptians. By my falcon, I will flog you with my own hand if you have left your good sense in the cages with your pedigreed cats, for in the time of the late Pharaoh you were an eminent warrior, I hear, which is doubtless why Pharaoh has entrusted you with this tedious task.”

He thumped the new commander on the back so that the little fellow gulped and gasped, and the words he had meant to say stuck fast in his throat. Horemheb sprang up on deck in two strides, and the soldiers straightened themselves and greeted him with raised spears.

He waved his hand at them, crying, “Farewell, scum! Obey this little pedigreed pussy, who now bears the whip of command. Obey him as if he were a child, and see to it that he does not tumble off his chariot or hurt himself with his own knife.”

The soldiers laughed and shouted his praise, but he grew wroth and shook his fist at them, saying, “I shall not bid you farewell! We shall meet again in a little while, for I can see your purpose in your eyes. I say to you: Behave yourselves and remember my words, or I shall have the hide of your backs in ribbons when I come again.”

He asked where I lived and told the officer of the watch, but he forbade him to send his baggage to my house, believing it to be safer aboard the warship. Then as in the old days he laid his arm about my neck and sighed, “Truly, Sinuhe, if anyone has earned an honest carouse tonight, it is I.”