River god - Smith Wilbur - Страница 110

• Предыдущая
• 110/177
• Следующая

  No civilized people would burn and plunder and murder as they did. The fact that we torture traitors cannot be weighed in the same scale as the atrocities committed by these barbarians.

  It is a truth that I have often observed, that a nation chooses its gods to suit its own nature. The Philistines worship Baal, and cast live infants into the fiery furnace that is his mouth. The black Cushite tribes worship monsters and creatures from the underworld with the most bizarre rituals. We Egyptians worship just and decent gods who are benevolent towards mankind and make no demands for human sacrifice. Then the Hyksos have Sutekh.

  It seemed that Remrem's captives were not the only Egyptian traitors travelling with the enemy host. With a hot coal in his anus, one of Remrem's captives had told of some great Egyptian lord from the Upper Kingdom who sat upon King Salitis' war council. When I heard this, I remembered how I had wondered at the knowledge that the Hyksos had displayed of our order of battle upon the plain of Abnub. I had guessed then at the presence of a spy among them who knew our secrets.

  If any of this was true, then we must expect that the enemy knew all our strengths and weaknesses. They must know the plans and defences of all our cities. Especially they would know of that rich treasure that Pharaoh had accumulated in his funerary temple.

  'Perhaps this explains the haste with which King Salitis is driving on towards Thebes,' I suggested to Tanus. 'We can expect them to attempt a crossing of the Nile at the first opportunity that presents itself to them.' And Tanus cursed bitterly.

  'If Horus is kind, he will deliver this traitorous Egyptian lord into my hands.' He punched his fist into the palm of his other hand. 'We must prevent Salitis from crossing the river, our ships are the only advantage that we hold over him. I must exploit them to full advantage.'

  He stamped about the deck, and looked up at the sky. 'When will this foul wind swing back into the north? Every hour the enemy's chariots draw farther ahead of us. Where is Nembet's fleet? We must join our forces and hold the river-line.'

  THAT AFTERNOON ON THE POOP-DECK OF the royal barge the state council of Upper Egypt convened before the throne. The high priest of Osiris represented the spiritual body, Lord Merseket: the chancellor stood for the temporal body of the: state, and Tanus, Lord Harrab stood for the military authority.

  Between them the three lords lifted Queen Lostris to the throne of this very Egypt, and placed her son upon her lap. While every man and woman on board the barge raised their voices in a loyal salute, the other ships of the fleet sailed past, and even the wounded soldiers dragged themselves to the rail to cheer the new regent and the young heir to the great throne of Egypt.

  The high priest of Osiris strapped the false beard of the kingship upon my mistress's chain, and it did nothing to detract from her beauty and manifest womanhood. Lord Merseket bound the lion's tail around her waist and settled the tall red and white crown upon her brow. Finally, Tanus mounted the throne to place the crook and golden flail to her hands. Now Memnon saw the shining toys that Tanus carried towards him, and reached out to snatch them from him.

  'A king indeed! He knows the crook is his by right,' Tanus applauded proudly, and the court roared their approval of this precocious behaviour.

  I think this was the first time that any of us had laughed since that dreadful day on the field of Abnub. It seemed to me that the laughter was a catharsis, and that it marked a new beginning for all of us. Up until that moment we had been overwhelmed by the shock of defeat and the loss of Pharaoh. But now, as the great lords of Egypt went forward one at a time to kneel before the throne on which sat this lovely young woman and her royal child, a fresh spirit sprang up in all of us. We were rescued from the apathy of despair, and our will to fight and to endure was resuscitated. Tanus was last of all of them to kneel before the throne and swear his allegiance. As she looked down upon him, Queen Lostris' adoration for him was so evident that it suffused her lovely face and shone like the sunrise from those dark green eyes. I was amazed that no other in all that throng seemed aware of it.

  That evening after the sun had set, my mistress sent me to the bridge of the state barge with a message for the commander of her armies. She summoned him to a council of war in the main cabin. This time Tanus dared not refuse her, for he had very recently sworn an oath of obedience.

  This extraordinary war council of which I was the only witness had barely begun, before the new regent of Egypt imperiously banished me from the cabin, and sent me to guard the door and turn away all other visitors. The last glimpse that I had of them as I drew the heavy curtain was as they fell into each other's arms. So great was their need, and so long had they been denied, that they rushed at each other like deadly enemies joining in mortal combat, rather than lovers.

  The happy sounds of this engagement persisted for most of the night, and I was relieved that we were not at anchor but driving on up-river in haste to join with Lord Nembet. The clunk and swish of the oars, the boom of the drum setting the stroke and the chants of the rowers on their benches almost drowned out the tumult in the royal cabin.

  When he came to the poop-deck at the change of the night-watch, Tanus had the smile and the satisfied air of a general who had just won a famous victory. My mistress followed him on deck shortly afterwards, and she glowed with a new and ethereal beauty that startled even me, who was accustomed to her loveliness. For the rest of that day she was loving and kind to all around her, and found numerous occasions to consult the commander of her army. Thus Prince Memnon and I were able to spend most of the day together, a circumstance that suited both of us very well.

  With the prince's dubious assistance I had already started carving a series of wooden models. One of these was a chariot and wooden horses. Another was a wheel on an axle that I was experimenting with.

  Memnon stood on tiptoe to watch the wheel spin smoothly on its miniature hub.

  'A solid disc is too heavy, don't you agree, Mem? See how swiftly it loses momentum and slows down.'

  'Give it to me!' he demanded, and snatched at the spinning disc. It flew form his chubby "fingers, dashed to the deck and shattered into four almost equal segments.

  'You are a Hyksos ruffian,' I told him sternly, which he seemed to take as a great compliment, and I went down on my knees to gather up my poor model.

  The broken segments still lay in a circular pattern, and, before my hand touched them, I had a strange aberration of vision. In the eye of my mind, the solid segments of wood became spaces, while the cracks between them appeared solid.

  'Sweet Breath of Horus! You've done it, Mem.' I hugged him. 'A rim supported by struts from the hub! When you are Pharaoh, what other miracles will you perform for us?'

  Thus did the Prince Royal, Memnon the first of that name, Ruler of the Dawn?with just a little help from his friend? conceive of the spoke wheel. Little did I dream then that one day the two of us together would ride to glory upon it.

  WE CAME UPON THE FIRST OF THE EGYPTIAN dead before noon. He came floating down the river with his bloated belly buoying him up, and his face gazing blankly at the sky. There was a black crow perched upon his chest. It picked out his eyes and threw back its head to swallow them one at a time.

  In silence we stood at the ship's rail and watched the dead man float serenely by.

  'He wears the kilt of the Lion Guards,' Tanus said quietly.

  'The Lions are the spear-head of Nembet's army. I pray to Horus that there will be no others following this one down the river.'

• Предыдущая
• 110/177
• Следующая