The Egyptian (62 page)

I bound up the wounds of slaves and treated their broken heads at the Crocodile’s Tail, while Merit tore up my clothes and Kaptah’s and her own also to make bandages for them, and little Thoth carried wine to those whose pain must be soothed. On the last day the fighting was confined to the harbor and the poor quarter, where the war-skilled Negroes and Shardanas mowed down the people like standing crops, so that blood flowed along the narrow streets and over the quays into the river. Death never reaped so abundant a harvest in the land of Kem as it did on that day.

The leaders of the slaves came to the Crocodile’s Tail while the conflict was raging, to refresh themselves with wine. They were drunk already with blood and the heat of battle. Smiting me on the shoulders with their hard fists, they said, “We have prepared for you a comfortable basket in the harbor where you can hide, Sinuhe, for doubtless you have no desire to hang head downward beside us on the wall this evening? Is it not time for you to hide, Sinuhe? It is in vain you bind up wounds which are instantly open again.”

But I told them, “I am a physician to the household, and none dare raise a hand against me.”

At this they laughed, drank copiously, and returned to the fighting.

At length Kaptah came to me and said, “Your house is burning, Sinuhe, and the horns have stabbed Muti because she threatened them with her washing club. Now is the time for you to array yourself in the finest linen and assume all the emblems of your dignity. Leave these wounded slaves and robbers and follow me to an inner room, where we may prepare ourselves to receive the priests and officers.”

Merit also put her arms about my neck and implored me, saying, “Save yourself, Sinuhe; if not for your own sake, then for mine and little Thoth’s.”

But grief, and lack of sleep, and death, and the din of battle had so befuddled me that I no longer knew my own heart, and said, “What care I for my house, for myself, or for you and Thoth! The blood that flows here is the blood of my brothers in the sight of Aton, and if Aton’s kingdom fall, I have no desire to live.”

But why I spoke thus wildly I do not know; it was another speaking, and not my vacillating heart.

Nor do I know whether I should have had time to fly, for shortly afterward the Shardanas and Negroes broke open the tavern door and forced their way in, led by a priest whose head was shaven and whose face gleamed with sacred oil. They began slaughtering the wounded. The priest put out their eyes with a sacred horn while the paint-striped Negroes jumped on them with joined feet so that the blood spurted from their wounds.

The priest cried, “This is the den of Aton; let us purify it with fire!” Before my very face they smashed in the head of little Thoth and slew Merit with a spear as she sought to protect him. I could not prevent it, for the priest struck me on the head with his horn, and my cry was stifled in my throat, after which I knew no more.

I came to myself in the alley outside the Crocodile’s Tail, and at first I did not know where I was, fancying that I had been dreaming or that I was now dead. The priest had gone and the soldiers had laid aside their spears and were drinking the wine Kaptah set before them, while their officers urged them with their silver-braided whips to continue the struggle. The Crocodile’s Tail was ablaze, for it was paneled with wood and burned like dry reeds on the shore. Then I remembered everything and tried to stand, but my strength failed me. I began to crawl on hands and knees toward the burning door and into the fire, to find Merit and Thoth. My hair was singed off and my clothes caught fire, but Kaptah hastened to me crying out and lamenting. He dragged me from the flames and rolled me in the dust until the fire in my clothes was put out.

At this spectacle the soldiers laughed aloud, and Kaptah said to them, “Truly he is a little mad, for the priest hit him on the head with his horn and will no doubt receive punishment in due course. This is Pharaoh’s physician, and it is not well for anyone to raise a hand against him. He is a priest of the first grade although he has been compelled to don shabby clothes and hide the symbols of his dignity so as to escape the fury of the people.”

But I sat in the dust of the street, holding my head in my burned hands. The tears poured from my scorched eyes as I mourned and wept, “Merit, Merit! My Merit!”

But Kaptah nudged me wrathfully, saying, “Silence, you fool! Have you not brought enough misfortune on us by your idiocy?”

When I was quiet, he brought his face close to mine and said bitterly, “May this bring you to your senses, lord, for now indeed you have had full measure, and fuller than you know. I tell you, though it is now too late, that Thoth was your son, conceived when first you lay with Merit. I tell you this that you may gather your wits about you. She would not tell you because she was proud and lonely and because you put her aside for the sake of Pharaoh and Akhetaton. He was of your blood, that little Thoth, and had you not been raving mad you must have seen your eyes in his eyes and known again that line of lip. I would have given my life to save him, but I could not because of your madness, and Merit would not leave you. By reason of your madness they died. I hope that you will now come to your senses, lord.”

I stared at him thunderstruck.

“Is this thing true?”

But I needed no reply. I sat on in the dust of the street, dry eyed, feeling no pain from my wound. All within me was cold and tight, and my heart closed up so that I was indifferent to all that went on about me.

The Crocodile’s Tail stood in flames and with it burned Thoth’s little body, and Merit’s in its loveliness. Their bodies burned among those of butchered slaves so that I could not even preserve them to eternal life. Thoth was my son, and if what I believed was true, the holy blood of the Pharaohs had run in his veins as it ran in mine. If I had known this, everything would have been different since a man may do for his son what he would not do for himself alone. But now it was too late. I sat in the dust of the street amid the smoke and flying sparks, and the flames from their bodies scorched my face.

Kaptah carried me to Eie and Pepitamon, for the fighting was over. The poor quarter was still in flames, but they sat in judgment on golden thrones on the stone quay, while soldiers and horns led forward prisoners for trial. Everyone caught with a weapon in his hand was hung head downward from the wall, and everyone caught with stolen goods on him was cast into the river to feed the crocodiles. Everyone found wearing the cross of Aton was flogged and sent to forced labor. The women were handed over for the pleasure of the soldiers, and the children were given to Ammon to be brought up in the temples. So death raged by the waterside in Thebes, and Eie showed no mercy for he desired to win the favor of the priests. He said, “I cleanse the evil blood from the land of Egypt!”

Pepitamon was exceedingly wroth because slaves had plundered his house and opened the doors of the cats’ cages. They had taken the cats’ milk and cream home to their children so that the beasts had starved and run wild. He also was merciless, and within two days the walls of the city were crammed with the bodies of men hung by the heels.

In jubilation the priests reerected the image of Ammon in his temple and made very great sacrifice to him.

Eie appointed Pepitamon governor of Thebes and hastened to Akhetaton to compel Pharaoh Akhnaton to abdicate. He said to me, “Come with me, Sinuhe, for I may need the help of a physician to bow Pharaoh to my will.”

And I answered, “Certainly I will come, Eie, for I desire my pleasure to be full.”

But he did not understand what I meant.

Thus I sailed back to Akhetaton with Eie. Away in Tanis Horemheb had also heard of these events, and he made speed to man the warships and hasten up the river to Akhetaton. All was quiet in the cities and villages as he came; the temples were open once more, and the images of the gods had been restored to their places. He hastened to reach Akhetaton at the same time as Eie, to compete with him for power, so he pardoned all slaves who laid down their arms and punished no one who of his own free will exchanged the cross of Aton for Ammon’s horn. The people praised him for his clemency, although it did not come from his heart but rather from his desire to save fit men for the fighting.

Akhetaton was a domain accursed; priests and horns guarded all the roads leading thither and slew every fugitive from it who refused to make sacrifice to Ammon. They had also barred the river with copper chains that none might make his escape that way. I did not recognize the city when I saw it again, for a deathly silence reigned in the streets, the flowers in the parks had withered, and the green grass had turned yellow now that no one watered the gardens. No birds sang in the sunshriveled trees, and all over the city hung the hideous odor of death. The families of high rank abandoned their houses, and their servants had been the first to flee, leaving all behind them, for no one dared to carry anything with him from the accursed city. The dogs had perished in their kennels, and the horses had starved in their stalls because the fugitive grooms had hamstrung them where they stood. Akhetaton the fair was already a dead city, breathing corruption, when I came.

But Pharaoh Akhnaton and his family lingered in the golden house. The most faithful among his servants had remained with him and also the elder members of the court, who could not conceive of a life elsewhere than with Pharaoh. They knew nothing of what had passed in Thebes because no courier had arrived in Akhetaton for a month. Provisions were running out, and by the will of Pharaoh their only food was the hard bread and the gruel of the poor. The more enterprising speared fish in the river or killed birds with their throwing sticks and ate this food in secret.

Eie the priest sent me first into the presence of Pharaoh, to tell him of all that had happened, because I was Pharaoh’s trusted friend. So I went, but all within me was frozen. I felt neither joy nor sorrow, and even to Akhnaton my heart was closed. He raised his gray, haggard face with its dead eyes and said, ‘Sinuhe, are you the only one to return? Where are all who were faithful to me? Where are those who loved me and whom I loved?”

I said to him, “The old gods rule again in Egypt, and in Thebes the priests make sacrifice to Ammon amid the rejoicing of the people. They have cursed you, Pharaoh Akhnaton, and they have cursed your city. They have cursed your name to all eternity and are already chipping it away from the inscriptions.”

He moved his hand impatiently, and suffering was kindled again in his face as he persisted, “I do not ask what has happened in Thebes. Where are my faithful ones and all whom I loved?”

I answered, “You still have your fair wife Nefertiti. Your children also are with you. Young Sekenre is spearing fish in the river, and Tut is playing at funerals with his dolls as usual. What do you care for any others?”

He answered, “Where is my friend Thothmes, who was your friend also and whom I loved? Where is he, the artist, by whose hand the very stones were imbued with eternal life?”

“He died for your sake, Pharaoh Akhnaton,” I answered. “Negroes transfixed him with a spear and cast his body into the river to be devoured by crocodiles because he was faithful to you. Though he spat on your couch, do not think of that now that the jackal howls in his empty workshop.”

Pharaoh Akhnaton raised his hand as if to brush a spider’s web from his face; then he recited the names of those he had loved. Of some I said, “He died for your sake, Pharaoh Akhnaton.” And at length, “The power of Aton has been crushed. The kingdom of Aton on earth is no more, and Amman rules again.”

He stared before him, and with an impatient movement of his bloodless hands he said, “Yes, yes. I know. My visions have told me of it all. The eternal kingdom cannot be contained within earthly boundaries. All shall be as before, and fear, hatred, and wrong shall rule the world. Better would it have been if I had died, and best of all if I had never been born to see all the evil that is done on earth.”

His blindness so enraged me that I retorted heatedly, “You have not seen so much as the least part of the evil that has come about for your sake, Pharaoh Akhnaton! You have not seen your son’s blood run over your hands, nor has your heart been frozen by the death cry of your beloved! Therefore your talk is empty, Pharaoh Akhnaton.”

He said wearily, “Go from me then, Sinuhe, since I am evil. Go from me, and suffer no more upon my account. Go from me, for I am weary of your face—I am weary of all men’s faces, for behind them all I see the faces of beasts.”

But I sat on the floor before him and said, “Not so, Pharaoh; I will not go from you, for I will have my full measure. Eie the priest is coming, and at the northern boundary of your city the horns of Horemheb have sounded, and the copper chains that bar the river have been severed that he may sail to you.”

He smiled slightly, threw out his bands, and said, “Eie and Horemheb, crime and violence: these then are my only followers now!”

Thereafter we said no more but listened to the gentle purring of the water clock until Eie the priest and Horemheb entered the presence of Pharaoh. They had disputed violently with one another, and their faces were dark with passion. They breathed heavily, and both talked at once without respect for Pharaoh.

Eie said, “Abdicate, Pharaoh Akhnaton, if you would preserve your life. Let Sekenre rule in your stead. Let him return to Thebes and make sacrifice to Ammon, and the priests will anoint him and set the red and white crown upon his head.”

But Horemheb said, “My spear shall maintain the crown for you, Pharaoh Akhnaton, if you will return to Thebes and make sacrifice to Ammon. The priests may growl a little, but I will quiet them with my whip, and they will forget their grumbling when you declare a holy war to conquer Syria again for Egypt.”

Pharaoh Akhnaton surveyed them both with a lifeless smile.

“I will live and die as Pharaoh,” he said. “I will never submit myself to the false god, and I will never declare war and preserve my power by blood. Pharaoh has spoken.”

With this he covered his face with a corner of his garment and went, leaving us three alone in the great room with the odor of death in our nostrils.