Scroll of Saqqara(5)

The temple of Neith was dropping slowly behind him and his bearers slowed, obviously tired. The torchlight was brighter now, for the inhabitants of North-of-the-Walls could afford to employ light-carriers to patrol the streets. Khaemwaset rearranged his cushions, listening to the challenges of the night-watch and his foot soldiers’ response. Occasionally his herald, Ramose, would call a warning and Khaemwaset would watch the passersby go down in the dusty street to touch their foreheads to the earth until his litter had gone. But the people were few. They were at home, eating or preparing for evening visiting with friends, and the night life of the city had not yet begun.

Presently Khaemwaset heard the voice of his own porter and his gate creaked open. Bodyguards saluted from their stations outside the high, mud-brick wall as he went through, and the gate clanged shut behind him. “Put me down here,” he called. “I will walk now.” Obediently the litter was lowered and he alighted, beckoning to Ramose and his soldiers. He set off along the path that skirted the rear garden and intersected other paths—one into the shrubbery and towards the fish pools, now invisible but for dark smudges to the left, one to the kitchens, granaries and workhuts of his servants, and one to the small but pleasantly appointed house where Khaemwaset’s concubines lived. There were not many of them and he did not often visit their domain or summon any of them to his couch. His wife Nubnofret ran their lives as she ran her family household, with rigid efficiency, and Khaemwaset left it all alone.

The path now ran under the shadow of his house wall and round the corner to the front, pausing to detour under the white entrance pillars with their bright red-and-bluepainted birds that trailed palm fronds and river weed from their sharp bills. It ran on across Khaemwaset’s carefully nurtured lawns and between the sycamore trees to the white watersteps and the calm, swiftly flowing river. At the junction Khaemwaset paused, sniffing the air, his eyes turning towards the Nile. It was the end of Akhet. The river was still full, a rolling brown and blue torrent of fecundity, but it had returned to its banks after the annual flood and the peasants had begun to fling seeds onto the saturated ground. The feathery palms that lined the drainage canals, the acacia thorns and sycamores, all glistened with the sheen of new, pale-green leaves, and in Khaemwaset’s gardens the vivid clusters of flowers had begun to bloom with an abandon that assaulted the eyes and filled the nostrils with delight. Khaemwaset could not see them but their scent was all around him.

He watched the early light of the new moon glint fretfully on the river, now silver slivers, now darkness, as the night breeze stirred the choked growth on the banks and lifted the tree branches. The watersteps were a deserted invitation, and he envied Hori who must surely even now be reclining in the bottom of his skiff, Antef beside him, their fishing lines tied to the boat while they watched the stars and gossiped. His fountain tinkled like music in the darkness, and the monkeys sighed and snuffled in their favourite spot under the stone basin, which still held the warmth of the day’s heat. “I would like to drift on the river tonight,” Khaemwaset remarked to his patient retinue, “but I suppose I must see what has been going on in my absence.” Privately he thought that an hour on the river would not do him any good. He was inexplicably tired. His lungs hurt from inhaling the old air and dust of the tomb, and his hips ached A massage and a good sleep on his own couch would help. “Ramose,” he said to his herald. “Tell my wife that I have returned and I am in my own quarters. If Penbuy’s litter has come back, I will look over any letters from the Delta that may have been delivered in my absence. Tell Ib I want food immediately, and Kasa can wait until I have finished with Penbuy before giving me a massage. Amek?” The captain of his bodyguard approached and bowed. “I will not be going out tonight. You can stand these soldiers down.” Without waiting for a reply, he walked in under his pretty pillars.

His reception hall, where guests were greeted and entertained, was spacious and cool, the floor tiled in plain black and white, the walls plastered and painted with scenes of himself and his family fowling in the marshes, fishing, or relaxing in the garden under their sunshades. The colours he had insisted be used when the house was built were the traditional whites, blacks, yellows, blues and reds of antiquity, and the few pieces of furniture set about for his guests were equally simple in design, made from Lebanon cedar inlaid with gold, ivory and lapis.

He had managed to override his wife’s protestations here. She had not wanted to give their guests the impression that the mighty Prince and sem-priest Khaemwaset, son of Pharaoh and virtual unofficial ruler of Egypt, had poor taste, but after a violent argument she had for once been defeated.