failure to speak?
“Where did you practice your trade, Nebenkemet?”
The carpenter stared at Bak, saying nothing, as if trying to decide whether or not he should answer. “I toiled at a ship yard in Mennufer.”
Rough work among rough men, so Bak had been told. He had never seen the shipyards, but he doubted the building of ships could account for all the scars on the carpenter’s hands and lower arms, and those on the back of his legs looked like the marks of a whip. Perhaps he had failed to obey a hard taskmaster. Or maybe he was a man who became aggressive when besotted and involved himself in numerous brawls.
Nebenkemet released the donkey and let it trot to the well, where a drover was drawing water and pouring it into a deep, wide-mouthed bowl buried almost to the neck in the sand so thirsty animals would not tip it over. Another donkey was al ready drinking, so the new arrival had to wait. Bak caught the halter of the nearest laden donkey and drew it close. As the carpenter lifted a jar from its back, Bak removed the con tainer from the opposite side. The two men’s eyes met across the animal’s back. Nebenkemet looked quickly away, as if he feared his eyes were windows through which Bak might read his thoughts.
If only such were the case, Bak thought. “Where will you get building materials for use at the fishing camp?” he asked, thinking a less personal question might open a path through the man’s defenses. “I’ve been told that the coastline all along the Eastern Sea is as barren as these desert wadis.”
“Amonmose will see that I get whatever I need for the boat. As for the huts, I’ll build them of stone.”
Bak glanced at the high walls of the wadi, at its floor lit tered with fallen boulders and rocks, and gave the carpenter a wry smile. “There’ll be no shortage of stone, I’ll warrant.”
A suspicion of a smile touched Nebenkemet’s face, but again he failed to pursue the opening Bak had provided.
“Do you expect the tasks to keep you long at the fishing camp?”
Nebenkemet shrugged as if indifferent.
Bak was becoming irritated. Normally a man would at least participate to some extent in a conversation. Talking to this man was like talking to a tree. “Did you ever meet Min nakht? Speak with him?”
Rather than the negative Bak expected, Nebenkemet said,
“Amonmose did all the talking. I watched and listened.”
“You were toiling for Amonmose even then?” Bak asked, surprised.
“His wife wanted a shrine in her garden. I built it.”
That Amonmose would ask a man he knew and trusted rather than a stranger to accompany him on a hazardous jour ney such as this made sense. That the merchant would take a tough-looking man with him when searching through the rough houses of pleasure along the waterfront of Waset made more sense. “What was your impression of Minnakht?”
“He was a man whose dreams outstripped reality.”
Bak was intrigued that a man of no learning should have seen something in the explorer that the worldly Amonmose had missed. “In what way?” he asked, openly curious.
“He talked of this desert as if the future of the land of Kemet lay here. As if all good things could be found if a man would but seek them out. His enthusiasm knew no bounds.”
Nebenkemet eyed the land around him with a contemptuous scowl. “He may’ve been right in thinking that here can be found gold and precious stones. What he never once consid ered was how hard won they’ll be.”
The long speech was a measure of the craftsman’s skepti cism, Bak felt sure, but he also sensed a depth of feeling he could not account for. “User believes there’s something out here to be found.”
“He speaks with more caution than Minnakht did. He sees the world more as it truly is.”
“What do you think happened to Minnakht?”
Glancing at the high, nearly vertical walls of the wadi, at the stones scattered along its floor, Nebenkemet returned the same wry smile Bak had given him earlier. “There’s no short age of rock in this desert, or of steep slopes down which a boulder could fall.”
Bak did not know what to make of this man. He felt sure that one as powerful as he could slay another with ease, but would he take a life? Under what circumstances? Their unsat isfactory conversation had revealed nothing of his character.
Bak lay beneath an overhanging rock, trying to rest. His men, sleeping close by in the narrow strip of shade, had planted spears in the ground and had fastened sleeping mats between them to stave off the hot wind, but the stifling air and tumbling thoughts would not let him nap.
His discussions through the morning had given him much to think about. He had come no closer to identifying the dead man or the one who had slain him, but he had learned enough about his fellow travelers to realize how unlikely each man was to have set off on an untrodden path through an empty and unknown land. Except for User, the lifelong explorer.
The willingness of these men to venture so far afield, he sus pected, was a measure of Minnakht’s persuasiveness, his ex citement when describing his adventures. Here he faced another exception: Nebenkemet, the skeptic.
Few men had the ability to draw others in their wake. What had Minnakht said to lure them into this rocky wasteland?
Had he altered his tale to fit each man’s need? Or had he se duced them with a single tale and a pledge of secrecy?
Bak could think of no more disparate a group of people on what promised to be a hard and dangerous journey. Which man would prove strong enough to go on, no matter how dif ficult the circumstances? Who would falter and have to be helped? With the donkeys able to carry a minimum of water and supplies, with wells or springs as much as three days apart, they could not offer unlimited aid to a seriously injured man. What would they do if faced with such a decision?
Would they be able to find nomads willing to help? Where were the nomads? Nebre and Kaha had found fresh tracks around the well and signs that a small group of people had camped in the shade. A shallow puddle had remained in the bottom of the bowl, indicating that they had watered their an imals not long before Bak and the others had arrived. Why had they moved on in the heat of the day? Where had they gone? Had the nomad Nebre and Kaha seen earlier in the morning warned them of the approaching caravan? Even if he had, their leaving made no sense. If the people of this
Eastern Desert were anything like the tribesmen on the southern frontier, they were a garrulous lot, as eager to speak with strangers as they were to pass news to friends.
His thoughts settled on questions more relevant to his mission: What happened to Minnakht? Was he alive or dead? If he was as highly respected by the nomads as every one seemed to think, how could he have vanished with no one the wiser? In what way was his disappearance related to the dead man and to the man who had gone missing nearly a year ago?
Bak awakened to the sound of falling water, droplets strik ing the earth around the edge of his shelter. He shook off sleep, looked out into the bright sunlight, snapped his eyes shut. Sunlight and rain? He sat up abruptly, nearly bumping his head on the stone above, and glanced around. Another smattering of sound. Small stones peppering the earth around him. Someone or something was standing above his shelter on the rim of the steeply inclined wadi wall.
Nebenkemet’s words came back to him: “There’s no short age of rock in this desert, or of steep slopes down which a boulder could fall.”
He scooted out from the shade and, leaping to his feet, yelled, “Move! Away from the hillside!”
Psuro and the Medjays, accustomed to acting without question, obeyed instantly. Bak darted away from the over hang and at the same time looked up the long, steep slope of eroded grayish rock. He thought he glimpsed something at the top, but could not be sure. Whatever it was vanished as if it had never been.
User, accustomed to life in the rough and attuned to dan ger, had been as quick to act as the Medjays. Nebenkemet moved almost as fast. The other men left their resting places half asleep and grumbling. The carpenter stared up the in cline above Bak, then flung a quick glance at the officer, evi dently remembering the words he had spoken so short a time before.
“What happened?” User asked, hurrying to Bak’s side as the Medjays gathered around.
After a brief explanation, Bak sent Nebre and Kaha out to find a way to the top of the incline. “I may be
