5

THE THOUGHT OF THOSE DAYS on the river still brings a lump to my throat, for I was still half a child and hopeful, and trusting in both gods and men. Just beyond On the Nile divided and became the three mighty tributaries and several smaller ones that emptied into the Great Green. Our barges took the north-eastern finger of the river, the Waters of Ra, and as I sat cross-legged on the deck I saw a slow miracle take place. Gradually the aridity and barrenness of summer gave way to the sweetness of spring. The air grew heavy with the scent of growing things. Papyrus thickets crowded the verdant shores, their dark green stems and delicate fronds weaving and whispering in the cool breeze. Everywhere there was fertility. Birds flocked and wheeled, piped and fluttered. White cranes and ibis stood motionless in the shallows, seemingly as bemused at the riotous lushness of the life around them as I was. And there was water everywhere; glinting half-glimpsed through dense trees, lying blue and still in full irrigation canals, rippling with the wash of tiny brown bodies bobbing up and down in the ponds. It was not surprising, I thought as I inhaled the distinctively sweet odour of what I came to know as the fruit orchards, stripped bare at this season, that the foreign tribesmen coveted such a paradise. The cattle that lifted their incurious heads and watched us glide by were somnolent and fat with health. The Waters of Ra became the Waters of Avaris. We passed the temple of the cat goddess Bast in the red glow of a perfect evening, and lit our fires amid a soft but constant susurration of insect song.

On the afternoon of the following day the outskirts of the most beautiful city on earth came in sight. The mighty Osiris One, Ramses the Second, had built Pi-Ramses to the east of the ancient site of Avaris where the ramshackle hovels of the poor leaned drunkenly together around the temple of Set, Ramses’ totem, and greeted the traveller from On with dust, noise and filth. I had never seen distress like this. I wanted to avert my eyes, but before I could tear my gaze away a jumbled pile of stones took its place. I learned later that it was the remains of an even older town, its name lost in antiquity. A string of trading barges obscured my view, its crew and ours exchanging coarse insults as it was forced to tack towards the shore to make way for us. Indeed, the river had become thick with craft of all kinds, each bent on appropriating the few open stretches of water, and the air was full of shouted expletives. When the traffic eased, the ruins had gone, to be replaced by the great canal Ramses had built to surround his city-palace. Here we had to wait, for the junction was choked with craft, but after much yelling and swearing a path was cleared for us. We began to drift to the right.

Now my dissatisfaction turned to awe. On our left was a vast and confusing collection of warehouses, workshops, granaries and storehouses, cacophonous with busy life. The canal had widened into a vast pool into which quays extended. Goods of every description were being loaded and unloaded. There were children everywhere, little naked half-wild beings who scampered like rats over the wares and called to each other in shrill voices.

Beyond this, the city showed another character. Gardens and orchards surrounded the white houses of minor noblemen and officials, merchants and foreign traders. The polite peace of a modest affluence permeated them.

After a while the pool narrowed again, and this time it was guarded by armed soldiers in light skiffs. Looking ahead I saw my Master’s captain answer a challenge. The skiffs drew aside and we slid through the small opening into the Lake of the Residence, Pharaoh’s private domain. There was not much to see. The southern wall of the palace was far too high to show anything of what was within, and it seemed to go on forever, finally curving away to be replaced by more impeccably groomed gardens. Here there were dazzlingly white marble watersteps against which several large craft rocked. Gold and silver glittered on their sides, their masts, their exquisitely damasked cabins, and each one flew the imperial colours of blue and white. They were Pharaoh’s own barges. Seeing the flag Hui’s vessel was flying, the guards thronging the watersteps saluted, and then we were past them and the sheltering wall came back to meet us.

When it ended, more estates began, but these were different. I could not see the houses for the walls that enclosed them. Tree branches leaned over towards the water, and the tops of stiff palms spiked against the sky. The watersteps were all of marble, and where they ended there were wide paved courts in front of the pyloned and doubtless well-watched entrances. The people who really mattered in Egypt, the Viziers and Treasurers, the Butlers and Overseers, the High Priests and Hereditary Nobles, lived here. Those people know Pharaoh, I remember thinking as Hui’s barge nosed to the bank. I will see people who speak with the Horus of Gold himself.

Servants had appeared, running across the paving to secure Hui’s barge and settle the ramp on the watersteps. Behind them a large man came slowly forth from the shadow of the entrance pylon and stood at the top of the steps. I should say glided forth, for he moved with a heavy yet graceful dignity. Everything about him was round, from his thick upper arms gripped by silver armbands to his substantial waist, to the cords of his calves. His bare skull shone. One pendant earring swung against his thick neck. His fleshy mouth was hennaed orange and the cold eyes that flickered rapidly over the mêlée developing on the watersteps were emphasized with kohl. He spoke one sharp word and my companions, who were pressing and jostling to be first on our ramp, fell back.

Hui emerged from the cabin of his barge. As always when in public he was invisible beneath his white shroud. Striding the ramp and mounting the watersteps he received the big man’s short bow and together they walked across the paving, in under the small pylon, and were lost to sight. Kenna and a few of the servants from the house went next, and then there was a concerted rush from the second barge. I found myself swept along with the crowd, off the barge, onto the stone that was hot beneath my bare feet, and through the entrance. The friends of my voyage scattered, obviously glad to be home, and I was alone.

I could hear the activity still going on behind me. The barges were being unloaded. But I stood in my grubby, now tattered sheath, feeling lost and out of place. Two paths ran out from where I stood. One went to the right, plunging under trees towards a wall glimpsed through the foliage. I presumed that it led to servants’ quarters, for the people had disappeared along it. The other went straight ahead. All around me trees, shrubs and palms were densely massed, obscuring my view. Flower beds were laid out neatly beside the walkway. I was tempted to follow the faces that I knew, to seek reassurance, but mutinously decided that, seeing no one had told me where to go, I should go where I pleased.

I set off along the central path and soon came to an open area with seats and a fountain that splashed its water into a large circular basin. To left and right the path diverged and on both sides were thorn hedges. Rather timidly I peered over one to find myself looking at a fishpond. Lotus pads floated on its quiet surface and an old sycamore cast its shade on the verge. The other hedge completely enclosed a pool that must be used for swimming, for a small curtained hut had been built at one end and someone had left a linen tunic and an empty cup on its stone edge. Skirting the fountain I continued on. The path took me past a kiosk, a small shrine in which there was a stone offering table, hollowed at one end, and an exquisite statue of ibis-headed Thoth whose tiny black-painted eye stared back at me. I bowed to him as I passed.

Then the trees thinned and I came to a gate before a wide, paved courtyard. The house was before me, its entrance pillars painted white and resplendently embellished with the likenesses of exotic birds and vines that curled up to meet the roof. I could see the rest of the sheltering wall now, running high and forbidding behind more trees to either side of the house and behind it. Set in the wall to the right was a double door that must also lead to a servants’ domain—kitchens and granaries probably, and perhaps stables, though I did not think that Hui would like to drive a chariot. Once more I hesitated. Should I march up to the entrance hall and announce my presence? I could dimly see a guard, or perhaps a doorkeeper, sitting on a stool beyond one of the pillars. For a moment I toyed with the idea of making my way home again and having done with all this ignominy. How could Hui have forgotten me, after our vital conversations? Well, they were vital to me anyway.

I retraced my steps, enjoying the cool, dappled shade of the little forest, the green silence in which I moved. Arriving at the fountain I went through the thorn hedge to the pool and settled myself beside its clear depths. I was thirsty and afraid, but I made myself remember my prayer to Wepwawet and how it was answered. The thought consoled me. I could always walk into the markets of Pi-Ramses and hire myself out as a domestic servant. My mother had taught me the value of cleanliness. My services would go to one of the rich merchants whose homes I had admired, and he would have a son. I would be scrubbing the paving before his door and the son would emerge, darkly handsome, lonely. I would glance up and he would see, for the first time, my blue eyes. He would be intrigued, then obsessed. His father would rage, his mother cry, but a wedding contract would follow … So I dreamed, nervous and adrift, while the glinting water netted the sunlight and a curious cat came stalking out of the hedge to sit in the shade and watch me with its unblinking, myopic stare.

A long time afterwards, when my fantasy had run its course and I knew I must do something, a man came hurrying from the other side of the clearing. I rose as he approached me red-faced and out of breath.

“Are you Thu?” he panted. I nodded warily. “Oh, thank the gods!” he exclaimed. “Where have you been? I was sent to find you an hour ago. I thought you might be with the other servants so I’ve turned the compound upside down.” He glanced around the pool. “You are not supposed to be here unless on the Master’s business,” he reproved me mildly. “These gardens are for the family only. Follow me.”

“Family?” I echoed as I trotted to catch up with him. “Hui has a family?”

“Well of course he does,” the man replied irritably. “His mother and father are retired to their acres outside On. If you want to know more you must ask him yourself and take the consequences. Servants are never allowed to question their betters unless it has to do with their duties. He does not encourage gossip. You really are a provincial, aren’t you?”

That closed my mouth, although I burned with questions. I had thought of the Master as a creature of lofty aloneness, self-sufficient, almost self-generating. But a family? Were they all monsters? The servant had taken a path that ran between the outer wall of the estate and the trees and we had to angle across the blinding expanse of the courtyard to reach the entrance. The doorkeeper on his stool did not acknowledge us.

A short way in under the pillars a huge room opened out. It was dim and cool after the furnace of the outer court. Light poured down in brilliant shafts from several thin windows high under the ceiling. More white pillars were spaced across the gleaming, tiled floor. The furniture was sparse and elegant, a few cedar chairs inlaid with gold and ivory, low tables topped with blue and green faience work, but the walls were alive with scenes of feasting. I had no chance to examine them then. I padded after my escort, whose own sandals slapped busily as he strode. A group of men were clustered beside one of the pillars. Hui was one of them. I could not be sure that he saw me but if he did he made no sign. His hooded head turned and then turned back.

At the far end of the hall and immediately to my left, beyond the wide double doors that stood open, a flight of stairs rose steeply. To my right were other rooms whose doors were firmly closed and between them a guard sat. Ahead was a passage running away to left and right and directly in front of me, twenty steps away, a square doorway led onto a terrace and more gardens before the wall loomed.

But my attention was fixed at once on the man who was rising from behind a desk by the stairs. It was as though a small mountain had chosen to move, for it was the person I had seen above the watersteps. He had been impressive then. He was terrifying now. Unsmilingly he looked down on me, inspecting me from head to dusty toes with those impassive black eyes, then he folded his great arms across his barrel chest and sighed. The earring quivered gently against one pouched cheek. “Go,” he ordered the servant with me. The man bowed and disappeared along the passage. “So,” he went on resignedly. “You are Thu. You are also a nuisance. This is an efficiently run household, and you are no longer free to go where you please when you want. I have been instructed as to your status and handling by the Master, therefore do not complain about any order you may receive. If you have questions you will put them to me or to Disenk. You will not approach the Master under any circumstances unless he sends for you. Do you understand?” I nodded vigorously. His voice was a rumble of threatening power. “Good,” he continued. “Follow me.”

He moved with surprising agility to the foot of the stairs and began to mount, his kilt swaying gently about his oddly delicate ankles. Meekly I did as I was told. He had not introduced himself. I supposed I was too much of a nonentity for him to bother. At the top of the stairs there was a dark passage flanked by many doors. He led me almost to the end before opening one of them and gesturing me inside. I blinked. The room was full of sunlight that cascaded through the large window ahead of me. There was a couch of wood, draped in fine linens and cushions. Beside it was a table on which stood an alabaster lamp. Two chairs were arranged haphazardly by the window. A huge feathered fan was propped against one wall. A pair of matching chests also hugged the wall, large, handsome things with bronze fittings. A woman stood in the middle of all this luxury. Slight and tiny, dressed in a spotless but plain sheath, her hair tied high with a red ribbon, she smiled at me and bowed to my companion. “Disenk, this is Thu,” he said brusquely. “You can begin by giving her a bath. Scrape off some of that Aswat muck and pluck her eyebrows.” He did not wait for an answer. The door closed firmly behind him.

Disenk and I eyed one another through the sun-soaked air. She was still smiling, her hands behind her back, expectancy on her little face. I did not yet understand that a conversation was usually opened by the person of highest rank in a room so I too waited, nonplussed, then to cover my confusion I wandered over to the window and looked out. I was directly above the entrance, and below me one of the men I had seen in the hall was just getting onto a litter. He twitched the curtains closed and the four slaves in attendance lifted it and set off towards the gate and the trees. I decided to speak. “Who is the big man who brought me up here?” I asked. “He told me that if I have any questions I am to put them to him, or to you.”

“That is Harshira, the Master’s Steward,” she answered readily. “He is responsible for the running of the household and the keeping of all the Master’s accounts. His word is law.”

“Oh.” I turned back into the room a little shyly. “Where are my things, Disenk? My basket and my box?” She went at once to one of the chests and lifted the lid.

“They are here, safe. The Master forgets nothing. Would you like to bathe?” She was being polite. The Steward had already commanded her to give me a bath. As if my swim in the Nile every evening was not enough!

“Not really,” I said, “but I will if I must. What I want is to be told where I am to sleep. And I want a drink.” A small frown creased her unlined brow. She gestured broadly.

“But this is your room,” she told me. “You will sleep here.”

“Do I share it with you?” I looked about for the pallet on which I supposed I would lie. She laughed.

“No, Thu. It is all your own. I sleep close by. Would you like water or beer or wine? There is also pomegranate or grape juice.”

“My own?” I whispered. I had never imagined such space, such opulence. I had presumed that I would be housed with the other servants outside the main grounds. I thought of the room I had shared with Pa-ari. It had seemed large enough, but it would fit in here four or five times over. “I would like beer,” I said with an effort, and she opened the door and called. Not much later a small boy appeared carrying a tray. Disenk took it from him and set it by the couch.

“There are raisins and almonds if you are hungry,” she said, pouring beer and handing me the cup. “Then we must go to the bath house. Harshira forgets nothing either!” I took the cup and drained it. There was no cloudiness and little sediment in the dark liquid. Immediately Disenk offered me the dish of nuts and dried fruit.

“Are you to be my companion, my guardian, what?” I questioned her as I crammed a handful of the appetizing mix into my mouth. “I would like to know where I stand, Disenk.” Once again an expression of pain furrowed her brow as she watched me.

“Your pardon, Thu,” she said, distressed, and I thought for a moment that I had somehow offended her. “A lady does not talk with her mouth full. Nor does she take so much food that her cheeks bulge. It is ugly and unseemly.” I stared at her, feeling the surge of truculence that always rose in me when anyone gave me advice or a reprimand.

“I am not a lady,” I retorted. “Everyone has been reminding me of that fact since I left Aswat. I am a peasant girl. Why should I try to be anything else?” Yet I swallowed hurriedly and resisted the urge to scoop up more raisins and almonds.

“You are very beautiful,” Disenk said gently. “Forgive me for upsetting you, but my orders are to refine and civilize that beauty. I hope you will not find my lessons too humiliating. I intend only good.”

Her mention of beauty mollified me. No one but the Master had ever called me beautiful before, and that was only off-handedly, in passing. Vanity in girls was not encouraged in my village. It was thought to breed idleness and selfishness in a world where hard work and obedience were admired. Even Pa-ari had done little more than tease me for my blue eyes. “I believed that I was here to assist the Master in his labours,” I probed cautiously. “Why must I learn such frivolous things?” Her gaze dropped. Black eyelashes quivered against the fine-grained patina of her skin.

“I am only your body servant,” she murmured. “Harshira has not seen fit to acquaint me with the Master’s purposes for you. Now if you are refreshed we will go to the bath house.”

“My body servant?” I gaped at her incredulously, while wanting also to laugh. “I am to have a body servant?” For answer she smiled again, politely, and going to the door she held it open.

“It is time to bathe,” she said firmly.

There were more stairs at the opposite end of the passsage to the one I had ascended, almost outside my door. These were narrow, and led down to a small interior courtyard surrounded by the walls of the house where a date palm spread its stiff shade in complete privacy. One other door led out from it, and to my left as I stepped onto the stone paving of the courtyard was a dim entrance. I followed Disenk into it. The room had a sloping stone floor with a raised slab in the centre. It was damp and cool. Huge urns brimming with water from which a sweet but subtle scent emanated lined the walls, and shadowy recesses held unrecognizable pots and jars. Disenk gestured. “Please remove your sheath,” she requested in a tone that I soon came to know as a good-natured command, then she vanished. Uneasily I did as I was told, dropping my worn clothing and feeling immediately vulnerable. A wave of homesickness engulfed me and then was gone. I wanted to step out into the late afternoon glow of sunlight streaming past the doorway of the bath house but was afraid of being seen naked by invisible eyes.

I was hesitating when Disenk reappeared, followed by two female slaves carrying dippers and linen towels and a young man in a loincloth. I shrank back dismayed as he approached me, my hands going instinctively to cover my genitals. His appraisal, however, was completely impersonal. He ran a hand down my calf. “Very dry,” he muttered. Lifting my foot, he kneaded it briefly, and here I heard disdain in his words. “These feet are very calloused and rough,” he complained. “I cannot be expected to work miracles, Disenk.”

“Castor oil mixed with sea salt to begin with,” Disenk ordered. “The feet must be abraded. As for her skin, olive oil and honey should suffice.”

“But so much body hair,” he grumbled, the massive muscles of his shoulders and arms flexing as he lifted my tresses and expertly felt my spine. “Good lines though.” I spoke up.

“I will thank you to keep your opinions to yourself,” I retorted, though inside I was cringing with shame. “It is bad enough that I am being forced to bathe as though I am dirty when I swim in the river every single day, but I will not stand here and be discussed like a cow being judged in the market-place!” He smiled in surprise, and for the first time he looked me full in the face.

“Your pardon,” he said formally. “I am only doing my job.”

“Like Disenk,” I said, allowing anger to mask my humiliation, and he bowed.

“Like Disenk,” he agreed. Going to one of the recesses he selected several pots before leaving the room. Disenk signalled. Still mutinous, I got up on the slab and the slaves sprang to life. Water from the dippers cascaded over me, then hands rubbed me vigorously with grains of a substance I identified as natron. More water sluiced off the salts. My hair was washed and coated in olive oil, then wrapped in a towel. I was dried gently, then led outside. The slaves bowed and vanished as silently as they had come.

Meekly, my skin tingling, I lay on the portable table that had been set up under the palm. Disenk knelt beside me, tweezers in hand. “This will hurt,” she told me, “but from now on I will remove the pubic hair twice weekly and the pain will be less. I will shave your legs and under your arms in a moment.” I nodded, then looked up at the trembling fronds of the tree outlined against a slowly blushing sky while she set to work. The pain was indeed intense and I supressed the urge to pull away from it. “Your pardon, Thu,” she went on, her head bent over my abdomen, the tweezers making pricks of fire, “but you must not swim in the river any more. For one thing, water alone cannot cleanse and soften the skin and for another, a lady does not expose herself to direct sunlight for fear that her colour may deepen and she may begin to look like a peasant. Your colour is too dark. You must stay indoors or walk under the protection of a canopy so that it may become pale and attractive. I will treat your skin with meal of alabaster to hasten the lightening process.”

I wanted to kick out and stop the steady throbbing of my tender region. I wanted to grab up my comfortable, shabby sheath and thumb my nose at Disenk and her snobbishness, running out through the house, into the gardens, away from all this nonsense, but the die had been cast and my metamorphosis had begun. Each ruthless manipulation of Disenk’s tweezers took me further from my origins, and in the end I accepted my hurt, gritted my teeth, and remained silent.

When she had plucked my genitals she attacked my eyebrows, her tiny, perfect face pressed close to mine, her pink tongue protruding delicately as she concentrated, then she shaved me with a sharp copper razor while another slave held a bowl of steaming hot water at her elbow. At last she rose and I made as if to scramble up but she shook her head, jerking her fingers imperiously at someone out of my sight. The young man was back, looming over me suddenly as he set his pots on the ground. “Better,” he observed drily, and I sighed. “Turn over, Thu.” I did so. Cool oil slid onto my back, and as his hands descended onto my shoulders I felt every muscle in my body loosen. Perhaps being a lady would not be so bad after all. I closed my eyes.

Much later, tired and hungry again, I submitted to a further washing of my hair, sat while Disenk slipped a pair of papyrus sandals onto my newly softened feet, stood while she wrapped me in voluminous linen, and followed her back to the quiet safety of my room. The sun had long since left my window and the sky beyond it was red swiftly dissolving into darkness. The bedside table had been moved to the window and was crowded with dishes whose odours sent a gush of saliva into my mouth. Disenk removed their covers. There was broiled fish and hot fresh bread, grape juice and sticky figs, leeks in white sauce. I did not wait to be invited to eat but sat at once under Disenk’s watchful eye. The fish melted in my mouth and the flavour of the leeks was enhanced by something in the sauce that I had not tasted before. This time I took small portions and strove to be dainty.

There was a bowl of water by my hand, and before reaching for the figs I made as if to drink from it but Disenk shook her head. “That is for rinsing the fingers,” she explained, pushing the juice towards me instead, “and when you have done so and are ready to eat again I dry your hands.” She lifted a small cloth. Suddenly it was all too much for me and I had to swallow the quick tears that had risen.

“I’m so tired, Disenk,” I said. “I know it is wrong to waste food but I cannot finish this meal.” She laughed.

“Dear Thu,” she replied. “What you do not consume will go back to the kitchen or to the beggars outside the temples of the city. Do not fret. Come.” She lifted the table away from me and walked to the couch where she turned down the sheet and stood waiting. “Sleep now. My pallet is outside your door, in the passage, if you wake in the night and need anything.” Gratefully I approached the bed and clambered onto it, and she lowered the sheet over me. It was obvious that no prayers were to be said and I wondered who the totems of the house were. Thoth, certainly, for I had seen his shrine in the garden, but to whom was I to pray in order to sanctify my rest? What other gods guarded the inmates of Hui’s home through the night? Disenk was lowering the reed mat that covered the window, and the room filled with a slumbrous dimness. She walked to the table. “There is fresh water beside you,” she told me, gathering up the remains of my meal, “And I will leave the figs in case you are hungry in the night. Do you wish to be read to sleep?” Startled, I declined. She smiled, crossed the floor, bowed, and let herself out, the door closing softly but firmly behind her.

Drowsily I turned on my side and lay looking into the dusky stillness around me. I knew I should get up and face the south, where many miles and another life away, Wepwawet’s temple stood peaceful and gracious at the end of the path beside the river along which I had kicked up the dust with my bare feet so many times. I should perform my prostrations, say the words of gratitude and abasement that I owed to the god who had answered my plea, but I was unwilling to move. My muscles ached pleasantly from the expert massage the young man had given me and my mind, full to overflowing with a jumble of impressions, strange voices, instructions and anticipation, was exhausted. My stomach was full. My eyes closed. Mother always taught us that we must never ask someone else to perform a task we can do for ourselves, I thought as I curled into a ball and savoured the deep softness of the cushion beneath my head. But it seems to me that such virtues are reversed here. A lady is judged by how little she does for herself.

Do not become lazy and complacent, Thu, some part of my heart whispered to me. There may be dangers ahead that only a sturdy peasant girl could face. Swallow your pride and learn from Disenk. Obey those in authority over you. But never forget that your father is a farmer, not a nobleman, and the god who raised you up can just as quickly cast you down. But he won’t, I thought firmly. We have a special bond, Wepwawet and I, for he is a God of War and I am a warrior.