to let you go about your business until an hour or so before darkness falls. Then I want you on the rooftop across the lane, your eyes locked on this house.'
'You've only five more days, Lieutenant, and then-if your guess is correct-Djehuty will die.' Amethu, seated on a low stool in the shade of a portico, glanced over the edge of the scroll open between his hands, giving Bak a quizzical look. 'Are you closing on the slayer, or aren't you?'
'Perhaps.' Bak stood before the steward, resting a shoulder against a slim wooden column. A yellow cat paced the floor around him, rubbing against his legs.
'Humph!' Amethu rolled the document tight and dropped it into one of three baskets lined up beside his stool. 'You sound like a man who knows no more now than when these distressing events began.'
'`Like the granite in the quarries south of Abu, sir, this problem I must solve is made of many tiny granules, some transparent, others opaque, all squeezed so tight together they're difficult to pry apart.'
The steward gave him a sharp look, as if he suspected he was being made light of. 'Have you thought to bend a knee before the lord Khnum? A plump goose or a tender young kid would make a worthy offering.'
Bak vaguely recalled someone needling Amethu about religious fervor. 'I fear he'll pay no heed without diligent effort on my part.'
'Have you seen the shrine at the back of the god's mansion? The shrine of the hearing ear? I often go there. It's a quick way to seek the god's aid, convenient, providing solace in times of travail.' Amethu's bright eyes darted toward Bak. 'You, as a police officer, would find it of special comfort and worth. An image of the lady Maat is carved high on the wall, wings outspread to encompass all the world.'
If the steward had not been such a staid individual, Bak would have suspected him of using talk of the gods to retaliate for his own comparison of granite with the problem of murder.
'Sir!' An earnest-faced young scribe hurried across the patch of bare earth outside the colonnade, ducked into the shaded portico, and presented a large chunk of broken pottery to the steward 'Here's the inventory of linens, as you requested'
'So soon?' Amethu took the shard, glanced at the numbers, and scowled 'Are you certain you counted all the uncut lengths, the sheets, the…'
'Our supply is very low, sir.' The young man appeared untroubled by the implied criticism. 'Over the past few weeks, we've sent a large quantity to the house of death. With so many people dying within these walls…'
'Yes, yes, yes.' Amethu waved his hand, signaling silence. 'The subject is one I prefer to forget. You've no need to remind me.' He pursed his lips, thinking. 'Go now to the men counting jars and dishes. They're certain to need your help. We've given no pottery away.'
Puzzled, Bak watched the scribe hurry off. From the moment he had entered the compound, he had seen men scurrying hither and yon, writing pallets and water jars suspended by cords over their shoulders, carrying rolls of papyrus or baskets filled with limestone and pottery shards. Here, beneath the portico where Amethu sat, located at the end of three long, narrow warehouses, the activity was magnified tenfold.
'I've never before heard of anyone taking an inventory during the season of planting,' he said. 'Aren't your scribes needed elsewhere? Setting boundary lines, for example, or counting baskets of grain to send out to the fields as seed?'
Amethu's mouth tightened. 'This was Djehuty's idea, not mine. All this work. All this interference in tasks for which he has no aptitude. The man should be taken into the fields and…' His mouth tightened, cutting off whatever punishment he longed to mete out.
Drowning in an irrigation ditch, Bak suspected. 'From what I've seen and heard, he doesn't usually concern himself with the running of his household.'
Amethu glanced around, assuring himself that no one would overhear. 'Ineni,' he said, lowering his voice. 'It's his fault, his alone. He disobeyed his father, refusing to rid the estate of horses. Now Djehuty plans to disinherit him.'
Bak, raising an eyebrow, knelt to scratch the cat's head, making it purr. 'I thought he made an agreement at the time Ineni wed Khawet.'
'He did, but he vows to have it set aside.'
Bak's voice turned cynical. 'What does the governor mean to do? Plead his case before the vizier?' A man he's known for years, he thought, one he counts among his friends. Bak's heart went out to Ineni, who stood little chance of retaining his due.
'I see you understand.' Amethu eyed the shard in his hand, sighed, and dropped it into a basket. 'I've known Djehuty since childhood, and I seldom question his actions. But at times he goes too far.' His eyes darted toward Bak and his mouth snapped shut, as if he suddenly realized his anger had carried him into the opposing camp. 'Stress. That's what's bothering him now. The reason he's being so contrary, so irrational. Must you come to this villa day after day, poking and prodding and prying as if we were all vile criminals? Must that Medjay of yours always hang around, asking impertinent questions of the household staff and guards?'
Bak took a seat on a mudbrick bench that ran along the wall. He doubted the questions were rhetorical, but he chose to take them as such. 'You must've heard by now of my interest in the soldiers who vanished in the sandstorm five years ago.'
'I've heard you seek to blame Djehuty for their loss.' The steward scratched his prominent belly, frowned. 'Well, let me tell you, young man, he came as close-to death as any man can and still survive. He owes his life to the gods, to the lord Khnum. They alone saved him. Those of us who stayed behind in Abu knew not what was happening out on the desert or how greatly our prayers were needed.'
'I was told you lost someone in that storm.'
Laughter sounded through a door leading into the rightmost storage magazine, scribes finding humor in the most mundane of tasks. The cat jumped into a basket of scrolls and curled up for a nap.
Amethu failed to notice. 'You probably don't realize, Lieutenant, but the residents of this household talk to me. They confide in me as they would a respected uncle. I know you suspect one of us closest to Djehuty of slaying all who've died thus far, and I've been told you're aware that we each lost someone dear in the storm. You yourself have made it clear you think Djehuty's death the ultimate goal.' He paused to get his breath.
Bak bowed his head in acknowledgment. 'Go on.' 'From what I've been told, you've caught several of us at a time when our shoulders were bowed beneath the weight of anger or resentment. As a result, you've unearthed a multitude of personal reasons for wishing Djehuty dead.' 'None of which would've resulted in the death of five innocent people,' Bak pointed out.
'Exactly!' the steward said, smiling triumphantly. 'Unless the one who slew them believed the storm a path that would lead me astray. Or unless the dead are bound by some other tie I've failed to discover. Or unless the slayer's wits are so addled he's developed a taste for murder.' Amethu's smile faded. He opened his mouth as if to disagree, but could think of no opposing argument.
'Did you lose someone close in the storm?' Bak repeated.
'My only brother perished in the desert. He was much younger than I, but a man I held in high esteem. To this day, I miss him.' Amethu hastened to add, 'Let me assure you, I don't blame Djehuty. If I thought blame was due, I'd be the first to accuse. But I know him. I know him well.' His eyes probed the area outside the colonnade, searching again for an eavesdropper, and he lowered his voice to a murmur. 'Djehuty is usually a man of strong will, but he can sometimes be manipulated. I'm convinced someone offered poor advice and he, rattled by the tempest, heeded words he should've rejected.'
Bak could see he was getting nowhere. Amethu either sin cerely — liked Djehuty and could find no wrong or feared for his lofty position-or he was an accomplished liar. 'Because your tasks meshed with those of Hatnofer, you must've been as close to her as anyone. Other than mistress Khawet, of course.'
'Me?' Amethu shook his head. 'I'd not use the word `close.' Nor, I suspect, would Khawet. The woman ran this household in an admirable fashion, but she was as cold as a night can get on the desert.'
'As the confidant of all who toil in this villa day after day.. ' Bak could not help smiling. '… you've surely heard that I'm seeking a connection between her and those who died in the storm, or those who survived.'
'She was a foundling-as I believe you already knowand her husband died many years ago, leaving her childless.'
Bak allowed impatience to enter his voice. 'Few men or women exist alone, Amethu, and Hatnofer was no exception. She was mistress Khawet's wet nurse, which would've drawn them together as close as mother and daughter, at least when Khawet was a child. And I've heard rumors that many years ago Djehuty took the woman
