now, instead of going to him and sharing the success, the glory, I’ve come straight to you.”
“He has no one to blame but himself.” Maiherperi frowned at the scribes, whose voices had risen in a mild squabble. “This so-called malign spirit. . Do you have any idea who the vile creature might be?”
“If Pairi and Humay are found alive, they can be made to point a finger. If not. .” Bak hesitated, unwilling to commit 232
Lauren Haney
himself, but finally said, “I could guess, sir, but I wish to be more certain before I name him.”
Not long after daybreak the following morning, Bak strode into the courtyard at the hall of records. There he found Hori and Kaemwaset seated on woven reed mats beneath a portico, dipping chunks of fresh, warm bread into a bowl of duck stew resting on a hot brazier. To Bak, who had spent the night in the garrison and shared with the duty officers a morning meal of hard day-old bread and cold fish stew, the mingled smells of yeast and duck were as the food of the gods. Fortunately, they had enough for three, and the respite allowed him to tell them of his previous day’s successes.
After nearly emptying the bowl, they cleaned their hands with natron and a damp cloth so they would not damage the aged documents they would be handling. No sooner had they turned away from the remains of their meal than a yellow cat and five kittens crept out from beneath a bush to lick the bowl clean. Kaemwaset lifted a scroll from a shallow basket containing a dozen or so others. The seals were broken and the strings that had once bound them had in many cases rotted away.
Unrolling the scroll, the priest held it out for Bak to look at. “You see what we must contend with.” The papyrus had turned brownish with age, was torn, riddled with holes, and dotted with splotches large and small. “This document is no worse than many others we found,” he added, tapping the basket with a fingernail.
Bak took the musty-smelling scroll from the priest and, holding the brittle papyrus carefully, studied the uppermost lines of symbols. “Not easy to read.”
“No, sir. And errors can creep in through misunderstanding of the partial lines we can read.”
“Did a plan survive of Nebhepetre Montuhotep’s temple?”
“You should see it, sir!” Hori plucked a scroll from the basket. “It doesn’t look at all like the ruined temple. You wouldn’t know it’s the same building.”
Bak had hoped for more but was not surprised. “The mansion of the lord Amon in Waset has been altered many times through many generations. Even the initial plan of Djeser Djeseru has been changed during the few years since construction began. Can we expect less from a provincial king who pulled together a fragmented land and made it into a single grand whole?”
“He would’ve wanted better for himself as his power increased,” Hori agreed.
Taking the scroll from the young scribe, Kaemwaset unrolled it across his lap.
Laying aside the document he held, Bak bent close to look at the sadly decayed papyrus, whistled. “How certain are you that this was planned for Nebhepetre Montuhotep?”
“Some doubt arises,” the priest admitted. “It contains the name of Montuhotep and was found among the other scrolls we know were prepared during Nebhepetre Montuhotep’s reign. We must face the fact that it could’ve been drawn during the reign of a different Montuhotep-the name is slightly different-and placed with the wrong documents at a later time.”
“But you don’t think so.”
“Nebhepetre Montuhotep ruled for some years and he’d have wanted to display his expanding authority. I’d be less surprised to find his temple altered than a few others I’ve seen.”
Bak stared at the plan, so different from the temple he, Hori, and Kasaya had so painstakingly searched days before. “Have you finished with the archives? Or do you have more old records to go through?”
“We’ve one more section,” Kaemwaset said, “another fifty or so storage pots that have no labels denoting their contents. I suspect they contain documents thrown asunder during the years of chaos and gathered together later in too much haste to store and label properly. Between the two of us, it’ll take much of the day to go through them all, reading a sufficient amount of each document to be certain it is or isn’t what we seek.”
Kneeling to scratch the mother cat’s head, Bak scowled at the ancient plan spread across the priest’s legs. He was not sure how helpful it would be, but it was all they had and might be all they would ever find. “Get a fresh scroll, Hori. I wish you to take time out from your search to redraw this plan. Draw as much as you can clearly see in black ink, then with Kaemwaset’s help, fill in the missing or stained places with red ink. Maybe we can discover exactly what this is.”
The priest smiled his appreciation. “A good idea, sir. If this is an early version of Nebhepetre Montuhotep’s temple, a new and complete drawing might well be worth the effort.”
“Keep a close eye on Hori.” Rising to his feet, Bak grinned at the youth, letting him know he was teasing, at least partially so. “We spent many hours searching that temple and he knows it well. He must not add parts to the new plan that fit closer to his memory than does this aging papyrus.”
“Welcome, Lieutenant. Amonked has told me of you.”
Mai, the harbormaster, a stout man with a fringe of curly white hair that surely tickled the back of his neck, ushered Bak into the room he used as his office. “He speaks highly of you, and with good reason if all he says is true.”
“He’s probably exaggerating,” Bak said, smiling.
“I’ve known him for years and I’ve never known him to embellish a tale.” Mai walked to a large rectangular opening in the outer wall and looked out upon the harbor of Waset, with its many ships moored along the river’s edge and the bustling market where townsmen exchanged local products for the exotic objects brought by seamen from faraway ports. The opening reminded Bak of the window of appearances in the royal house, which served as a stage upon which their sovereign appeared before her subjects. “Did he ever tell you he once dreamed of sailing a large and imposing seagoing ship? One that would ply the waters of the Great Green Sea to Amurru, Keftiu, the southern shores of-” He stopped abruptly, laughed. “Suffice it to say, he’s traveled no farther than the Belly of Stones.”
“I stood with him on the battlements of the fortress of Semna, looking down upon the border between Wawat and Kush. I could see in his heart the wish to follow the river to its end.”
“So he told me.” Mai swung away from the window, motioned Bak onto a stool, and sat on a low chair that allowed him to look out at the harbor while they talked. “To what do I owe your visit, Lieutenant?”
“I’ve come to clarify something Amonked told me. Something I thought nothing of at the time.”
“I assume this involves the ancient jewelry my inspector found?”
“Yes, sir.” A harsh yell drew Bak’s eyes to the street below, where a spirited pair of chariot horses had knocked a woolly fleece from a merchant’s shoulder and trampled it.
The charioteer flung what looked like a garrison grain token at the man and drove on. “He said yesterday, when he informed me of your discovery, that you’d grown very excited when he told you, three days earlier, of the jar I found in Buhen with jewelry inside. Especially when he described the sketch around the neck, a necklace with a pendant bee.”
“That surprises you? It shouldn’t. After months of fruitless searching here and there and everywhere, we had something specific to look for. Who would’ve thought of looking inside a honey jar? None of my inspectors. Nor I, for that matter.”
“Lieutenant Menna didn’t come to you seven or eight days ago, when I told him of the sketch?”
“He did not.” Mai’s eyes narrowed. “You told him when?”
“A few hours after I arrived in Waset. He vowed he’d tell you right away.”
“Well, he didn’t.” Mai, obviously irritated, stared out the window at the many vessels moored there. The beat of a drum and the chant of the oarsmen announced the arrival of a cargo ship whose deck was divided into stalls filled with reddish long-horned cattle. Bak doubted the harbormaster saw the ship or its contents. “Menna seems a good-hearted soul, Lieutenant, rather touchy about what he perceives as the status of his assignment, but he’s not a man one can depend on.”
“Is he incompetent, sir? Or something else?”
Mai’s eyes darted from the window to Bak, his expression censorious, directed not to his visitor but to the man about whom he spoke. “I’ve heard he seldom visits the cemeteries, that he spends more time writing reports than supervising the men who guard the dwelling places of the dead.” His mouth tightened to a thin, critical line. “I’ve never seen him with a speck of dust on his kilt or sandals, and he always looks as if he’s fresh from his bath.
