The Murder of King Tut (10 page)

The bows were made of birch that was then wrapped in sinew and bark for durability. Gold leaf and ivory decorations adorned
their curved shafts. The instructor’s great bow was taller than Tut, while Tut’s bow was only big enough to reach just above
his knee when he stood it on the ground.

The instructor placed the bow in Tut’s little hands: “Now listen to me. You will want these with you in the afterworld. On
the day you are buried, all your bows will be buried with you. So learn to use them well, Highness. The rules of combat you
are about to learn will stand you in good stead… forever.”

Tut notched an arrow in the bow and pulled back the string. His shot hit the target cleanly on the first try, though it wasn’t
far from the boy.

“Very good, sire.
You are a natural.
”

1333 BC

“YOU’RE LATE. I won’t tolerate this, Tutankhamen. There’s no excuse for such conduct.”

Tut raced into the royal classroom at the prince’s school with mud from the Nile still coating the soles of his feet, his
favorite hunting bow in hand. He had been out in the reeds again, shooting ducks, and realized too late that it was time for
class.

He had no chance to clean up, and now, pharaoh-
in-training or not, he would face the instructor’s wrath.

“Instructor, I—”

“Quiet. Not a word from you. Sit down and practice your hieroglyphics.”

The teacher was a thin, dyspeptic young man who didn’t walk about the room so much as he flitted like a nervous bird. Tut
liked to mimic him for the amusement of his sister, but now she was too busy giggling at Tut’s misfortune for him to attempt
a joke.

The standard punishment for tardiness was to repeatedly write hieroglyphic characters on a piece of papyrus. The task often
took hours, which the instructor knew was absolute torture for Tut.

He was eight now, and his latest passion was chariot lessons. Two hours spent writing meant two less hours spent at the reins,
speeding across the open desert.

Much as his father would have hated it, Tut longed for the day when he would lead the warriors of Egypt into battle. He pictured
himself in a chariot, two mighty steeds galloping before him, an army of thousands responding to his every command. But this
was no daydream—it would actually come to be—and sooner rather than later.

“Well done, Pharaoh,” whispered his sister Ankhesenpaaten. She was a few years older than him, but mature in the way of deeply
practical children. And she was a beautiful girl, even better-looking than Tut.

“Someday,” the teacher announced, “when you reign over Egypt as the one true pharaoh, you can have me killed for my insolence,
but until then this is my classroom and you will do as you are told—and that includes arriving on time.
Am I understood, Tutankhamen?
”

A furious, red-faced Tut nodded his head and placed a fresh reed in his mouth, making sure not to make eye contact with his
sister, who now snickered at his misfortune. Tut chewed the end of the reed, feeling the fibers break apart until they formed
a loose and supple paintbrush.

Then he dipped his new writing implement into a bowl of water and touched it to a block of solid ink. He began to draw on
a piece of papyrus, his hand effortlessly forming the falcons, owls, feet, and myriad other images that made up the hieroglyphic
alphabet.

But soon the afternoon heat and the quiet of the classroom had his mind wandering. He loved the outdoors, and to be stuck
inside on such a beautiful day wounded his spirit.

Tut longed to be swimming in the Nile, ever mindful of the crocodiles that lurked there. Or maybe taking Ankhesenpaaten for
a chariot ride—he adored her. Or perhaps simply standing on a mountaintop, gazing out at the purplish rocks of a distant butte,
reveling in the fantastic notion that all of this land, as far as the eye could see, would one day be his.

This was not merely a boy’s daydream either—it was for real.

1333 BC

AS HE DREW HIS CHARACTERS, Tut kept an eye on his strict instructor, the bane of his youth. The last thing he needed was another
unjust punishment on top of the others he’d accrued. Nefertiti had been very clear in her warnings about Tut’s studies. If
he failed a subject or even fell behind, he would lose the right to go out beyond the palace walls. Tut could think of no
more horrendous penalty.

Then, to Tut’s amazement and joy, the same warm afternoon sunlight that had sent his mind wandering now cast a spell over
the instructor. Tut watched eagerly as the man rested in his chair and his eyelids began to close.

The instructor’s head then lolled back and his mouth
opened slightly, until, ever so softly, he began to snore.

Ankhesenpaaten put one hand over her mouth to keep from giggling. Tut gently placed his brush on an ivory palette and tapped
her on the shoulder while jerking a thumb toward the door.

“No,” Ankhesenpaaten mouthed. “We can’t do that, Tut. We
mustn’t.
”

Tut insisted, standing quietly and taking hold of her arm. With a quick glance at the instructor, whose soft snore was deepening
into something louder, she stood, too.

Together, the boy and girl royal tiptoed toward the door and the freedom of the river world. To be safe, Tut grabbed his hunting
bow on the way out.

Suddenly, Aye’s hulking torso blocked their path. “Where do you think you’re going?” the royal scribe boomed, making Ankhesenpaaten
jump in fear.

The instructor jerked awake and leaped to his feet.

Aye gripped Tut and Ankhesenpaaten tightly by the arms and dragged them back into the room, digging his fingernails into Tut’s
bicep. “Let go of me,” Tut cried, but Aye only squeezed harder. “I will be pharaoh one day, and you will be gone from the
palace. I promise it, Scribe. You too, Teacher!”

Then Tut wrenched his arm free and ran, and he didn’t stop running until he stood on the banks of the Nile. What was even
better was that Ankhesenpaaten had run with him—every step of the way.

1333 BC

“WHAT DO YOU THINK they’ll do to us if they ever catch us?” asked a smiling Tut, crouching down below the reeds so they wouldn’t
be seen by Aye or their other nemesis, the teacher.

Ankhesenpaaten was usually the practical one. Her impulsive decision to escape along with Tut had perhaps been the greatest
surprise he had known since the day their father died.

But it was a nice sort of surprise, the kind that made him feel less alone in the world. It felt really good to have a comrade
in arms—a friend—if only to share the inevitable punishment that would follow this outrageous adventure.

Tut looked into his sister’s eyes and smiled. Technically, she was his half sister, thanks to his father’s consort with the
ill-fated Kiya, and though she and Tut were the fruit of the same father, it more often felt like they were best friends than
brother and sister.

She was like him, and she wasn’t. It was hard to explain. Except that he loved her dearly. He so dearly loved his Ankhe.

“They’re not going to beat us,” Tut announced, answering his own question.

“Why do you say
‘they’?
” she asked. “It’s Mother who will determine our punishment.”

“That’s not exactly the way it works,” Tut said patiently. “Aye and the instructor are men. They think they have power over
Mother.”

As part of the process of learning to become pharaoh, Nefertiti had taken great pains to include Tut in important meetings
with her advisers. Even a boy could see that Aye coveted the great power that Nefertiti possessed. The royal vizier often
cast angry glares at Tut, as if the boy had somehow offended him by just being there.

Aye frightened Tut, and as Tut remained in the reeds thinking about him, he gently rubbed the marks Aye’s thick nails had
left on his upper arm.

“You need to watch out for Aye,” Tut told his sister. “I don’t trust him. Neither should you. I think he wants to marry Mother
and become pharaoh.”

Ankhesenpaaten smiled at this.

“He can’t do that, Tut. You’re the pharaoh.”

“Not if he marries the queen. Marriage into royal blood would allow Aye to take the throne.”

Tut paused to let that sink in, tilting his head to watch a duck extend its wings and lift them slightly upward as it glided
in for a landing.

“I don’t like that,” Ankhesenpaaten said softly, “and I don’t like Aye. Not a bit. He’s angry, and he’s rude to Mother.”

“We also need to watch out for Meri-Re, the high priest,” warned Tut.

“Why him?”

“He’s afraid that when I become pharaoh I will no longer worship Aten.”

“He would lose all his power and wealth if that happened.”

“Right. You’re a smart girl. Almost too smart somehow.”

“And General Horemheb is a sneaky one. Keep an eye on him also.”

“I will be wary of them all,” said Tut. Then he did something he really hadn’t expected to do. He leaned in close and kissed
Ankhe. And perhaps even more surprising, she didn’t protest.

Then, confident that they had avoided capture, the two children rose from their hiding place and sprinted toward the river,
laughing. They were less afraid of the crocodiles lurking there than of the powerful men crawling about the palace.

1908

HOWARD CARTER had been summoned.

His old friend and Antiquities Service boss, Gaston Maspero, wanted to meet and discuss Carter’s “future.” In the four years
since Carter had left his post, there hadn’t been much talk like that—more a hand-to-mouth existence that barely kept Carter’s
dreams alive and often made him look foolish for having them.

So Gaston Maspero’s request for a meeting was more than welcome. It could be a lifesaver.

The distance from the Winter Palace Hotel to the Valley of the Kings was roughly five miles. If one stood on the great marble
steps leading up to the hotel’s main lobby, it was possible to gaze across the Nile toward the distant cliffs that formed
the backside of the valley. When there was no wind and the desert dust was not clouding the air, those cliffs seemed almost
close enough to touch.

That’s the way Howard Carter felt every day of his exile. A man less passionate about Egyptology would never have debased
himself the way Carter had, standing out on the streets to hawk his wares to tourists, no different from the hordes of carriage
drivers, ferryboat captains, and beggars who lined the dirt road at the river’s edge.

Like them, he existed on the most meager of handouts. His serviceable watercolors would probably have been completely overlooked
and ignored were he Egyptian rather than European.

To say that Howard Carter’s life had fallen into disarray would be an understatement. He’d become a shadowy version of himself:
at once haughty and penniless.

To supplement his modest living as a watercolorist, he also sold antiquities on the black market, thus sinking to the level
of the men he’d once prosecuted for tomb robbery.

Carter dressed well enough, even though his clothes were worn, and still had a taste for fine food and expensive hotels, but
he’d become dependent on wealthy patrons to make his way. Adding insult to injury, his most beloved patrons of all, Lord and
Lady Amherst, had fallen on difficult times. They’d been forced to sell Didlington Hall in 1907, and Lord Amherst was in poor
health. At the age of thirty-four, Howard Carter had become little more than a self-educated sycophant.

Enter, thanks to Maspero, the inimitable Lord Carnarvon.

George Edward Stanhope Molyneux Herbert, better known as the Fifth Earl of Carnarvon—or, more simply,
His Lordship
—was a pale, thin man with a hound’s face pitted by smallpox. He smoked incessantly, despite damaged lungs; raced cars; owned
horses; and otherwise reveled in living the life of a wealthy, self-absorbed bon vivant. Even the 1901 car crash that had
almost killed him didn’t stop Carnarvon from spending his money recklessly and living a life of entitled leisure that no one
deserved—at least not in Carter’s opinion.

His Lordship had first come to Egypt in December 1905, thinking that the warm weather and dry air might help him recuperate.
That visit and subsequent other “tours” whet his appetite for all things Egyptian.

In winter he maintained a luxurious and spacious suite at the Winter Palace Hotel. Little by little, Carnarvon was transformed
from a man consumed by the here and now into a man consumed by the past—
the ancient past.

1908

NOW, LIKE MANY WEALTHY MEN who’d become smitten by Egypt and treasure hunting, Lord Carnarvon wanted to fund his own excavation.

The successes of Carnarvon and Theodore Davis were well known, and Carnarvon could easily see Davis’s yacht
Bedouin
moored across the street from his hotel. British acquaintances Robert Mond and the Marquis of Northampton also had minor
concessions, and Carnarvon began to believe he would enjoy digging up an important bit of history. He thought it should be
great fun
indeed.

Unfortunately, his first season’s results weren’t promising. Or much fun. Arthur Weigall—who now held Carter’s former job
as chief inspector for Upper Egypt—had dismissed Carnarvon for the rank amateur that he was. He assigned Carnarvon to a rubbish
heap known as Sheikh abd el-Qurna, with predictably dismal results.

The sole find during that first six-week season was a
mummified
cat
contained inside a wooden cat coffin.

Carnarvon, while disappointed, actually treasured the discovery. It was his first, after all. Egyptology was now officially
in his blood.

The only problem, it seemed, was Carnarvon. Rather than hire an experienced professional, he led the digs himself. Each day
he would sit inside a screened box that kept away flies, and smoke cigarette after cigarette, as his men, and
not
a top-notch crew, worked in the heat and dust.