For a long time Khaemwaset stood, trying to absorb the atmosphere of mingled pathos and otherness, the unattainability of a past that always taunted and whispered to him of simpler grander ages, while the last rays of sunlight went from red to sullen scarlet and began to thin. He did not really know what it was that he sought in his wanderings among the mute debris of the past. Perhaps it was the meaning of the breath in his body, the beating of his heart, a meaning that might transcend the revelations of the gods, though he loved and revered them. Certainly it was a need to slake the thirst without a name that had possessed him from his childhood and that, when he was younger, had brought tears conjured from some mysterious source within him that spoke of loneliness and displacement. But of course I am not lonely, I am not unhappy, he told himself while Penbuy coughed politely but warningly behind him and the tomb’s shadows began to snake towards him with the message to be gone. I love my family, my Pharaoh, my beautiful and blessed Egypt. I am rich, successful, fulfilled in life. It is not that … it never has been that … He turned abruptly before a wave of depression could overwhelm him.
“Very well, Penbuy. Let the tomb be sealed,” he said sharply. “I do not like the smell of this air, do you?” Penbuy shook his head and scuttled up the passage, with Khaemwaset following more slowly. The whole undertaking had left a sour taste in his mouth, a feeling of futility. It is all dead knowledge that I acquire from the scrolls and tomb paintings, he thought as he emerged, walked past the bowing slaves, and heard the crunch of their shovels in the earth once more. Old prayers, old spells, forgotten details to round out my history of Egypt’s nobility, but nothing that might give me the secret of life, the power over everything. Where is the Scroll of Thoth? What dark, dusty niche hides that treasure?
The sun had gone. In the mild, velvety sky a few stars had begun to prick and the chatter and laughter of his entourage quickened under the sudden flourish of fresh torches. Khaemwaset all at once wished to leave. Signalling to Ib he strode into his tent. An oil lamp now flickered by the cot, casting a friendly yellow glow, and he could smell fresh perfume. Ib padded forward and bowed. “Tell Hori to robe now,” Khaemwaset said, “and bring me my sem-priest’s garb. The acolytes can charge the censers and be ready. Are the food offerings blessed?”
“Yes,” Ib replied. “Prince Hori has been performing the prayers. Does your Highness wish to wash again before dressing?” Khaemwaset shook his head, suddenly weary.
“No. Send an acolyte and I will do the ritual cleansing. That will be enough.”
He waited in silence. Kasa appeared, the voluminous black-and-yellow-striped sem-priest’s garb held reverently across his outstretched arms, and stood with eyes downcast as an acolyte presented the Prince with a silver ewer full of scented water and helped him to undress. Khaemwaset solemnly began the ritual washing, murmuring the appropriate prayers to which the boy responded, and the sweet-acrid wisps of incense smoke began to curl between the tent flaps.
At last Khaemwaset was ready. The acolyte bowed, picked up the ewer and withdrew, and Khaemwaset held out his arms while Kasa slipped the long robe over his head. Both men went outside. There Hori waited in his role as a priest of Ptah, holding the long censer cup from which grey plumes floated, and the food offerings for the ka of the prince whose tomb they had politely disturbed lay upon golden dishes.
The little procession formed and moved with stately grace to the now invisible tomb entrance. The slaves were on their faces. Khaemwaset stepped forward, taking the censer from his son, and began the prayers for the preservation of the dead and the enjoining of the ka not to punish those who had today dared to look upon a sacred resting place. It was now fully dark. Khaemwaset watched his own beringed, long fingers glitter in the torchlight as they dignified the time-honoured words with gestures of respect and appeasement He had performed the same ceremony a hundred times over, and not once had the dead expressed offence at his probings. Indeed he believed that his careful restorations and food offerings had resulted in blessing upon himself and those he cared for from the kas of princely beings long dead and quite forgotten.
The ceremony was soon over. The closing words fell flat in the warm darkness. At last Khaemwaset knelt beside Hori to be disrobed, and rose while Kasa wound his white kilt around his still well-muscled waist and laid his favourite lapis-and-jasper pectoral across his chest. His eyes were gritty with fatigue. Are you coming home?” he asked Hori when Kasa had left to summon the litter bearers.
Hori shook his head. “Not unless you want me to help Penbuy file our finds today, Father,” he replied. “The night is so sweet that Antef and I are going fishing.”